Review of O Pioneers! by Willa Cather

What was it about?

After the death of her parents, Alexandra Bergson, a Swedish immigrant, becomes responsible for the well-being of her three brothers and for the running of the family homestead. Her friend Carl Linstrum suddenly leaves Nebraska for Chicago in hopes of making a fortune. When he returns after 13 years, Alexandra learns that Carl is on his way to Alaska. He has never found his place in the world. He is not alone. Marie Shabata is in a love-less marriage, and Ivar has earned the name “Crazy Ivar” for his outlandish mystical views. Faced with so many responsibilities, Alexandra does not have time to tend to her own personal needs. O Pioneers! by Willa Cather explores love and friendship in the beautiful but unforgiving Nebraska plains.

What did I think of it?

What can I say? Willa Cather has produced yet another literary masterpiece. Like My Ántonia, O Pioneers! chronicles the lives of immigrants from Scandinavia. In fact, O Pioneers! and My Antonia are the first and third books in Cather’s Great Plains Trilogy. The Nebraska plains are stunningly beautiful, but the immigrants who live in the region have only one thing on their mind – survival. Alexandra is forced to take on many responsibilities as a young woman, but she and her friends are constantly scrutinized by her two older brothers. The woman runs the homestead, but it never really belongs to her. Alexandra takes care of everyone else, but no one takes care of her. People marry for purely economic reasons, so romance, if it exists at all, is found outside of marriage. Willa Cather is one of the three most poetic writers I’ve ever encountered (the other two being Marilynne Robinson and Antoine de Saint-Exupéry).She can pack so much emotion into a phrase. While I thought My Ántonia was a more powerful work, the female characters in O Pioneers! are more compelling. If you love character studies, you will enjoy Cather’s novels.

Favorite Quote

“There was about Alexandra something of the impervious calm of the fatalist, always disconcerting to very young people, who cannot feel that the heart lives at all unless it is still at the mercy of storms; unless its strings can scream to the touch of pain.”