My Ántonia

Willa Cather Date Read: 1/9/22

First published: 1918

For the most part, I liked this novel. It is like a slightly grittier, more realistic Little House on the Prairie. With less detail about the baking and more sex (which happens off screen, but never happened at all in Wilder).

The story is sweet and it is a slice-of-life of a time many of us know little about, but probably should: the settlement of the American Midwest by immigrants. My family, that I know about, has been in this country for many hundreds of years. But most people, I think, can count recent immigrants in their family trees. If you live in the Midwest, those immigrants are probably Scandinavian or German. This is their history, as A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is for immigrants here in New York.

One discordant note was the rampant racism, most notably about the piano player Blind d'Arnaut. The description of this person by Jim is frankly one of the most offensive things I've ever read. Yeah, yeah, "it was the times" except it wasn't, not really. People who were racist felt free to speak it out loud but it isn't like everyone was racist. And I really did not like reading that. It soured the whole novel for me. "You can't put your values of today on the past", I don't care, yes, I can. I'm not reading this book in 1918, I'm reading it in 2022. We don't have to accept it just because people did then.

All in all, I would give this a 3.5 out of 5. It is obviously well written and tells a coherent story, but to be completely honest it is a bit boring in that very little really happens. The entire novel is Jim growing up to not marry Ántonia. Growing up, for most of us, was long periods of same-same punctuated with holidays and tragedies. Also, Jim's grandparents just disappear and aren't mentioned again after he goes to college in the East. They raised him and then poof.

Time to read: 1.5 days

Rereadability: Nah.

Classic: I guess? It isn't a bad novel, not by any means. But neither is it particularly special.