Kata's Progress -- Newly Read 1920's

Slowly I am making my way through the Pulitzer Prize winners. Two themes keep on popping up. The first is that the characters are living in a time of change. The second is that what is near and dear to one generation is often less important or even rejected by the next generation. Below is what I have read from the 1920'a since I posted here in November. My reactions to the books are on my blog.

• 1921 The Age of Innocence
• 1922 Alice Adams
• 1923 One of Ours
• 1925 So Big
• 1926 Arrowsmith
• 1928 The Bridge of San Luis Rey
• 1929 Scarlet Sister Mary

Laura's Review - One of Ours

One of Ours
Willa Cather
459 pages

This is the story of Claude Wheeler, a young man who grew up on a Nebraska farm in the early 1900s. Claude is pursuing a university education at a religious college chosen by his parents, but is both unhappy with his education and uncertain about his goals. While he longs for the finer things in life that come from an advanced degree, he also has a strong sense of family loyalty and will interrupt his studies to assist with farm work when necessary. When Claude's father buys a large parcel of land from another farmer, he also decides Claude will return home and assume responsibility for the original family farm. Claude sets aside his higher ambitions and throws himself into farming. He gets married and appears set to spend the rest of his days on the farm, until World War I breaks out and Claude decides to join the American forces in France.

My copy of this book came from my local library and, unfortunately, the book jacket included huge spoilers in its first two sentences. This threatened to ruin the book for me, but I tried to make lemonade from these lemons. Since I already knew about some pivotal events in Claude's life, I read with a view toward understanding why this book won the 1923 Pulitzer Prize. Typical of Cather's work, One of Ours is filled with vivid images of the American prairie, and the first- and second-generation immigrants who worked the land. Frankfort is a conservative community; its people are steeped in their faith and rather isolated from the broader world. As the threat of war loomed large, Claude's "mother had gone up to 'Mahailey’s library,' the attic, to hunt for a map of Europe,—a thing for which Nebraska farmers had never had much need. But that night, on many prairie homesteads, the women, American and foreign-born, were hunting for a map." Cather also shows the dark side of the community when certain members of German descent are charged with "disloyalty" and subject to a hearing in court. Cather's portrayal of wartime France is also very much focused on people, much more than the fighting. It's an interesting angle.

Since One of Ours was published just a few short years after the end of World War I, it was received at a time when emotions were still quite raw. Cather's writing is, as always, superb. And her portrayal of an innocent farm boy who serves in battle would have struck a chord for just about anyone. Unfortunately once I knew how things would turn out there were sections that seemed to drag on endlessly. I probably would have given this book a higher rating had there not been spoilers ... frustrating! ( )

My original review can be found here.

1923: One of Ours by Willa Cather

I’ve lived in Nebraska and know well the rolling landscape, the hard-working but easy-going people who farm and ranch the land there. Willa Cather’s prose, as far as I’m concerned, reflects perfectly their characters. That is the first impression that a reader takes away from One of Ours. And its protagonist, Claude Wheeler, reminds me of young people I’ve met there, who love their state and their families, but somehow don’t quite fit in. While Cather was writing about the turn of the 20th century, the story could indeed have taken place over 50 years later.

Claude’s pragmatic father doesn’t see the necessity, for a farmer, of too much education. Thus, Claude has to forego completing his college degree, and forsaking he friends, much different from those at home, he’s made in Lincoln. His mother, a more or less fundamentalist Christian (although the movement itself within Christianity hadn’t yet begun), is quite sensitive to Claude’s moods and aspirations; her emotional pain on behalf of her son is almost physical. Claude, as would be expected of a young man his age, marries—only to have his wife go to China to help her sister. His emotional desolation is nearly complete; he wonders if that’s all there is to life—getting up in the morning, working, going to bed at night. It may satisfy friends his age who ask nothing better than to farm their own land, but Claude longs for something more—what, he’s not sure but something.

Then World War I erupts in Europe. Claude and his mother follow the war through the newspapers and maps they pore over together. When the United States enters the war, Claude enlists—and finds his place in the world.

Cather describes the effect of the war on France and its people. She also writes about little-known facts, such as the toll sickness took of the soldiers on the way over, many dying from pneumonia. She has interesting details about what it was like for the soldiers to live under wartime conditions—bathing in polluted water in shell holes was a nice touch. There is some description—not much—of the fighting but it fits in with her story. Clearly she was more interested in what happened to the people, both French and the Allied soldiers, than she was in the details of the fighting itself.

The last pages break your heart. I think you have to be a stone to be unmoved.

For a relatively short book—371 pages in my edition, One of Ours is beautifully evocative of a time, a place, and a young man’s successful search for himself. One of the best of the early Pulitzer winners.