The Prairie Trilogy
by Willa Cather
Willa Cather's "Prairie Trilogy" Consists of three books, O Pioneers! (1913), The Song of the Lark (1915) and My Ántonia (1918). All three occur at different locations on the Great Plains during their pioneer phase, and vibrantly bring that world to life. All three explore different approaches to ambition, each leading to different outcomes. Combined they represent a multifacited meditation on a topic critical to the rapidly changing circumstances of the early 20th century and perhaps close to Willa Cather's own heart. The questions are still important in our own rapidly changing world.
Note: If you read one, read all three, and read them in order. Stopping in the middle is too haunting.
Told in five parts, O Pioneers! follows the Bergsons, a family of Swedish-American immigrants farming the prairie of Nebraska at the turn of the 20th century. After the death of her father, Alexandra and her brothers inherit the family farm, and struggle to keep it.
As the Nebraskan farming community grows and her older brothers build families and comfortable lives, Alexandra remains, attached to the land, her youngest brother, Emil, and her neighbor, Marie Shabata. These three central characters navigate duty, familial pressures, tragedy, and an uncertain romance.
Thea Kronborg, a minister's daughter in a provincial Colorado town, seems destined from childhood for a place in the world. But as her path leads her ever farther from the small town she can't forget and the man she can't afford to love, Thea learns that her exceptional musical talent and fierce ambition are not enough.
Young people grow up in the new settlements of the early twentieth century Nebraska prairie. This is a tightly written, haunting story with vivid descriptions.