Showing results by author "Willa Cather" in All Categories

Willa Cather was an American author who grew up in Nebraska. She is best known for her depictions of frontier life on the Great Plains. This collection was published in 1905. Although it is Cather's first collection of short stories, it contains some of her best-known work. All of the stories center around art and artists.

Thea Kronborg, gifted and passionate, struggles to leave the confines and constraints of a small Colorado town in order to move to a major metropolis and achieve an operatic career.

This story was first published in McClure's Magazine in 1905. Harvey Merrick, a famous sculptor, died of tuberculosis at the age of 40. As the story begins, a group of townsfolk waits for the arrival of the night train that is bringing his body back from the East for burial in the small Kansas town where he grew up. Only one man, however, understands what Harvey has accomplished since leaving their town. The rest of the town folk seem close minded and provincial.

In 1851, Father Jean Marie Latour becomes the Apostolic Vicar to New Mexico. While the area is American by law, it's still Mexican and Indian by custom and belief. During the years that follow, Latour tirelessly but gently spreads his faith while facing external and internal obstacles. Loosely based on the life of Jean-Baptiste Lamy and the construction of the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi, this novel chronicles the events that occur after the capture of the southwest by American forces during the Mexican-American war.

The story of a man who does not want to leave his old study for a new house.

Dissatisfied with his life on a Nebraska farm, with the ways of his family, and trapped in a loveless marriage, he searches for true meaning and beauty when he volunteers for the Army and is shipped to France during World War I.

"I first met Antonia on what seemed to be an interminable journey across the great midland plain of North America."

These are the first words, spoken by Jim, who leads us into Willa Cather's masterpiece about a spirited girl who, though down trodden by neglect and hard work, never "lost the fire of life". Every American must know Antonia, for once they do, they can never forget her.

On the banks of a Nebraska river several boys hear a story that causes them to plan a great adventure for their future. They could never quite get past a plan to find the Enchanted Bluff, but life has a way of stealing dreams from childish minds. A beautiful story of the hope of childhood in a time a few shades less complicated. Narrated by Glenn Hascall.

First published in 1926, this book is Willa Cather's sparest and most dramatic novel, a dark and prescient portrait of a marriage that subverts our oldest notions about the nature of domestic happiness.

Originally published in an 1896 edition of The Home Monthly, "The Burglar's Christmas" tells the story Crawford, a homeless man in Chicago who has not eaten recently and considers stealing food on Christmas Eve. Reminiscent of the parable of the prodigal son, this tale reflects on the nature of forgiveness. This recording of "The Burglar's Christmas" was recorded as part of Dreamscape's Classic Christmas Stories: A Collection of Timeless Holiday Tales.

This story is told from the perspective of Peggy, a teenager in the tiny town of Riverbank. Peggy is good friends with a girl named Nelly Deane. Nelly is considered by many to be the prettiest and most fun-loving girl in town. What happens to Nelly in the ensuing years after Peggy leaves Riverbank for college and then abroad is related through Peggy's infrequent visits back home and the letters she receives from one of the older women of Riverbank.

In the American Civil War that began in 1861 the War was seemingly fought to end Slavery. A War for Good. The result a win for the good guys but a society that still bears fractures from this seminal period. The stories in this volume show the true scars that are endured as a riven Nations authors try to explain and reconcile.

O Pioneers! is a classic moving tale of the frontier told in a powerful style and with a strong sense of character. When Alexandra Bergson’s father dies she is left with the responsibility of raising her younger brothers on their father’s unsuccessful farm. Alexandra is deeply involved with life as she meets the demands of laboring on the prairie farm, and wrestling with her conflicting emotions.

O Pioneers! is a story of the immigrants who came to America to build new lives for themselves. Struggling against poverty, ignorance, drought, and storm, they came to love and understand the land, until it rewarded them with a richness exceeding all imaginings.

"Paul's Case" was first published in 1905 in Cather's first collection of short stories, titled The Troll Garden. Similar to "The Enchanted Forest" featured in her Nine Stories published by Simply, it is one of the great writer's stories accessible to most young people in high school and college. It relates to what they feel, think, and want to be. Perhaps just as importantly, it depicts young people upset by their current circumstances, their families, and the drabness they perceive in their own lives.

A Lost Lady by Willa Cather is the story of Captain Daniel Forrester and his wife Marian who live in the western town of Sweet Water, along the Transcontinental Railroad in the 1920s. Neil Herbert, a boy who grows up in Sweet Water, admires the Captain and his beautiful, vivacious wife, who have the genteel lifestyle of small-town aristocrats and entertain powerful men. As Captain Forrester's fortune and health decline, Neil becomes aware of a different Mrs. Forrester, one who succumbs to alcohol and opportunistic men.

Love can be found anywhere. Aboard a steamer headed for New York, a young man falls in love with a married woman; but fate trumps hope, and leaves only bittersweet memories.

Presented here is Volume III of our Feminist Literary Classics series, featuring three of the most important feminist novels ever written: Orlando: A Biography by Virginia Woolf, O Pioneers! by Willa Cather and So Big by Edna Ferber. The first book in this collection is Orlando: A Biography, a groundbreaking English novel by Virginia Woolf that explores English history, gender roles and sexual politics in a way few books have before or since.

In this, Willa Cather's first novel, a successful bridge builder is torn between his beloved, charming wife and a beautiful Irish actress who had been his first love and has now returned to enchant and disrupt his life.

This masterpiece tells the story of the beautiful Mrs. Forester, the resident aristocrat of a failing Western railroad town, who is an enigma. As a boy, Neil Herbert loves her, and, witnessing her ups and downs in later life, he suffers over her trials and vulnerabilities.