Great Plains Trilogy #3
My Ántonia
219 pages, Paperback
First published September 1,1918
This edition
- Format
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219 pages, Paperback
- Published
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January 1, 1995 by Book of the Month Club
- ISBN
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9781583485095
- ASIN
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1583485090
- Language
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English
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Ántonia Shimerda
The bold and free-hearted young Bohemian girl who moves with her family to Black Hawk, Nebraska. Intelligent, optimistic, loyal, and kindhearted, the naturally gregarious Ántonia is forced to accept a difficult life after the death of her father. At the t...
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Jim Burden
The narrator and protagonist of the novel, Jim is a successful lawyer who grew up in Black Hawk, Nebraska. Jim is an intelligent, introspective young man who responds strongly to the land and the environment in which he lives. Unlike most other boys his a...
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Josiah Burden
Jim Burdens grandfather. A quiet yet deeply religious man who works hard on his farm in Nebraska.more...
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Emmaline Burden
Jim Burdens grandmother. She shows great concern and compassion for the Shimerdas and is a loving maternal figure for Jim.more...
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Ambrosch Shimerda
The Shimerdas oldest son. Mrs. Shimerda and her daughters dote on Ambrosch, claiming that he is brilliant and the reason they came to America....
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Lena Lingard
A Norwegian immigrants daughter and a friend of Ántonias. Lena has a brief liaison with Jim in Black Hawk and a more extended relationship with him in Lincoln, where she sets up her own dressmakers shop. Lena is pretty and blonde, and craves independence ...
About the author
She grew up in Virginia and Nebraska. She then attended the University of Nebraska, initially planning to become a physician, but after writing an article for the Nebraska State Journal, she became a regular contributor to this journal. Because of this, she changed her major and graduated with a bachelor's degree in English.
After graduation in 1894, she worked in Pittsburgh as writer for various publications and as a school teacher for approximately 13 years, thereafter moving to New York City for the remainder of her life.
Her novels on frontier life brought her to national recognition. In 1923 she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for her novel, 'One of Ours' (1922), set during World War I. She travelled widely and often spent summers in New Brunswick, Canada. In later life, she experienced much negative criticism for her conservative politics and became reclusive, burning some of her letters and personal papers, including her last manuscript.
She was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1943. In 1944, Cather received the gold medal for fiction from the National Institute of Arts and Letters, an award given once a decade for an author's total accomplishments.
She died of a cerebral haemorrhage at the age of 73 in New York City.
