Litsy

An update on my #192025 challenge: these are the books I finished in the past few months. 79 prompts done and 27 left to go. I'm optimistic I can finish this by the end of the year!
@Librarybelle

AllDebooks Oooh well done. 👏 I was doing really well and need to get back to it to update the last 6 months. 3w

Librarybelle Excellent job!! I still need to update my list, but I‘m not as far as you are in the challenge. 3w

bthegood Way to go - good luck on the last 27!🥳 2w

kwmg40 @AllDebooks @Librarybelle @bthegood Thanks for the encouragement. These last slots are getting harder to fill! 2w

39 likes4 comments

kwmg40

My Mortal Enemy | Willa Cather

pick

A short but poignant novel set partly during the Christmas season. I love the #VMC covers and was happy to have found this edition at a used book store.

#HolidayBookDragons #WinterGames2024 @LiseWorks
#gottacatchemallwinteredition (tbr) #FrozenSick @PuddleJumper
#BookSpinBingo @TheAromaofBooks
#192025 #1926 @Librarybelle

Librarybelle I am hoping to read one of her books for the challenge—I‘ve yet to read anything by her! 1mo

TheBookHippie I love this cover! 1mo

CarolynM This is one of my favourite Cathers🙂 @Librarybelle It‘s short but it packs a punch. (edited) 1mo

TheAromaofBooks Woohoo!! 1mo

40 likes4 comments

Litsi

My Mortal Enemy | Willa Cather

pick

My Antonia is one of the “best loved” American novels. I hate it, which is shorthand for saying that the book did not speak to me & I am jealous that it speaks to others. I decided to give her another read. I did this with Steinbeck last year and while I still hate The Grapes of Wrath, I happily found The Red Pony to be a marvel. I chose Cather‘s My Mortal Enemy. And it is a revelation. The characters & situation are drawn with care & pain.

CarolynM This and My Antonia are my favourite Cathers. 11mo

batsy I love this book, and if you're looking for another Cather to discover this one is close to my heart

The Song of the Lark

11mo

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Lcsmcat

Collected Stories | Willa Cather

#everyday #quotsyjun21 @TK-421

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batsy

Collected Stories | Willa Cather

pick

This collection has its high & not-so-high points, as complete story collections often do. Though reading it as part of the #catherbuddyread was fascinating, delving into it as we did after Cather's brilliant novels, in that it crystallises most of her prevalent themes: art vs commerce, freedom in spirit & mind, the sense of communion with nature & the universe that transcends day-to-day banalities, sensitive characters ill-adjusted to the world.

batsy If I wasn't blown away with this collection from start to finish, it's largely because I feel something about the novel form allows Cather the freedom for her ideas & sensibilities, & the short story form can sometimes render it rudimentary or simplistic. There were elements of conservatism or sentimentalism that in the novels become fully fleshed out & take flight. But all in all, what a splendid body of work Cather has produced. 4y

batsy Many thanks to @Graywacke and @Lcsmcat for organising and to fellow buddy readers for the always fruitful discussions! 4y

lazydaizee Nice book cover. 4y

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Lcsmcat Excellent summation! I don‘t believe I‘ve read an author‘s complete oeuvre in order before, and it was fascinating to watch Cather develop her voice, and to experience that with this amazing group gave me so many more insights! 4y

Graywacke @batsy enjoyed your thoughtful review and loved having you as part of our discussions. 4y

batsy @nuttybooklady It really is, though I had to make do with the ebook :) 4y

batsy @Lcsmcat @Graywacke Thank you. I don't think I have either; Cather might be the first author whose complete works I've read! And it was lovely discovering her with all of you 🙂 4y

CarolynM Great review, as always. I agree not all of the stories were up to the standard of the novels, but I thought a few of them were excellent. 4y

batsy @CarolynM Thank you! I agree, there were definitely some gems in here & even the stories that I weren't fond of had some indefinable quality, being Cather 🙂 4y

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Graywacke

Collected Stories | Willa Cather

pick

We learned a great deal about WC these last 3 months with these 19 stories and an essay. She was a dynamic author who reveals here much more complexity than her novels indicate. Beginning in a Henry James‘s style, she quickly cultivated her own voice, tying to various experiences in her life and imagination. I liked her novels better, but I love what this collection reveals. So, 5 ⭐️s. Thank you so much to our wonderful #catherbuddyread

Lcsmcat

Lcsmcat It was an amazing journey with our beloved Willa, and I think it distilled and clarified some of her ongoing themes. Thanks to everyone who participated and shared unique perspectives. 4y

Suet624 What a lovely photo of her. 4y

40 likes2 comments

Lcsmcat

Collected Stories | Willa Cather

The papal palace at Avignon reminds me of the cliff dwellings. Hmm. If, like me, you were expecting the surviving fragments you can read them here: https://www.willacather.org/system/files/idxdocs/willa_cather_nr_fall2011_vol_55... There‘s also explication, so if you just want the fragments scroll down to p 3. My reaction to Kates‘ work wasn‘t as violent as Chris Wolak‘s. How about yours? #catherbuddyread

Lcsmcat @Graywacke @CarolynM @batsy @jewright @Louise @Sace @Tamra @Suet624 @arubabookwoman @Currey @catebutler @Catherine_Willoughby @crazeedi @mdm139 @Tanisha_A @emilyhaldi @rubyslippersreads @KathyWheeler of course let me know if you want off or on this list. 4y

Lcsmcat Having trouble posting comments, so apologies to anyone who got multiple tags. 4y

Lcsmcat A couple quotes I marked from the essay, if Litsy will behave and let me post them. 🙄 4y

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Lcsmcat “Against the materialism of the aftercomers alone, the second generation, that lesser breed after the pioneers, was she to remain adamant in lifelong hostility.” We noticed this feeling, but “hostility” seems a bit strong/harsh to me. Thoughts? 4y

Lcsmcat About Old Beauty Kates said “She [Cather] is no longer at any pains to conceal her disillusion and aversion to most of the life about her.” Yet we saw that the title character might have felt that way, but Cather also drew Chetty as joyfully connected to the new. My 2 cents. (edited) 4y

Currey @Lcsmcat I think you capture Cather‘s disillusionment exactly. I do not think it was the just the first generation and then all was degradation. Rather there were exceptional people that persevered and were able to flourish spiritually in the new land but many more who were unable to. The subsequent generations also had their rare individuals but the times called for different characteristics. 4y

Currey @Lcsmcat Cather also appreciated much of what the second generation would bring, the sculptor, the singers, etc. It was the materialism that accompanied the arts that caused her to write with despair 4y

Lcsmcat @Currey Right! I don‘t think she was hostile to an entire generation. And there were those among the pioneer generation she did not revere, so I felt Kates distorted things a bit. 4y

Graywacke (Sorry, struggling today. Vaccine.) I found Kate‘s essay equal parts annoying and interesting. He brought up a lot of information and ideas I didn‘t know or hadn‘t had laid out for that way. I really liked his take on The Professor‘s House. But many of his perspectives I found irritating. I would have found a more respectful writer, if I‘m the editor. 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat i see a lot to like in those two quotes, and I remember the first one. I think in general she really didn‘t like the post wwi world. 4y

Graywacke So, this Avignon story. This is Petrarch‘s time. In 1340 he‘s around the corner, in Vaucluse, criticizing Avignon bitterly. As I‘m reading Petrarch now, I kept looking for a reference. Surely she couldn‘t use the date of 1340 without thinking about Petrarch. ?? !! That‘s him as his prime. In 1348 his Laura will die of the plague. Anyway Kate didn‘t go there or touch on it in any way. I wonder what Cather was thinking about P. 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke Sorry the vaccine hit you hard! I was intrigued by Kates‘ “arc” if you will, of Cather‘s work, but put off by his certainty that his interpretation was the only one. The source I linked above proposed that Avignon was to be part of a triptych with Archbishop and Shadows on the Rock - a sort of French Catholic theme if you will. I liked that perception. 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke Ooh, that‘s a cool connection. Cather was steeped in the classics so I bet you‘re right. 4y

Currey @Graywacke Given Cather‘s interest in historical transitional times, I suspect that Cather was more interested in the transformation that the world was going through as Philip IV forced his will into the selection process for Popes and pulled the French popes into “Babylon”, than in the stunningly romantic poetry of Petrarch but hey, what do I know.... 4y

Graywacke @Currey I suspect both, but i may be biased. Had she chose 1320 or 1360 I would agree more. But 1340? It surely seems to make a call that way. P isn‘t just poetry but also the founder of Humanism and definer of the dark ages. (edited) 4y

Currey @Graywacke What of his should I read other than poetry? Or “stack” as they say on Litsy....I know nothing about this time. I just read Albigenses which takes place in the 13th Century but Maturin wrote it in 1824 so it is infused with the language of Sir Walter Scott. However, I still learned a great deal about “the church”. 4y

Graywacke @Currey hmm. I think Wikipedia. 😆 I know, not helpful. No, seriously, I‘m reading P‘s poetry now and I‘m not sure I would recommend it. And that‘s his best stuff. You kind of really need to want to read him to read him. However, he‘s fascinating to read about. (edited) 4y

Currey @Graywacke Ahhh, read about. That I can do! (edited) 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke Do you like sonnets in general and don‘t recommend Petrarch‘s, or are you not a sonnet aficionado? Because he was so influential in the form, and I love sonnets, but I haven‘t read Petrarch. Shameful, I know. 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat his are the only i‘ve read. ☺️ I value him but i‘ve not become a huge fan of his obsession with Laura and his own love pains. So it‘s a context issue. And translation issue. I‘m reading 3 translations and each is so different. 4y

Graywacke *content (not context) 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke The translation can make so much difference, especially in poetry! I think I‘ll try library editions to see which translator I prefer. Whenever I finally get around to P. 😀 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat i like Wyatt‘s 🙂 That Wyatt, from Henry Viii era. Also Morris Bishop. Mark Musa is plain. And David Young is just not my taste. Wyatt, of course, is writing his own poem and claiming it‘s a translation. I don‘t know how much of Petrarch he translated (or, his milieu translated). 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke Good information. Thanks. 4y

batsy I like that connection between the cliff dwellings & Avignon—the "enchanted bluffs" that underlie her work. I liked Kates' essay & thought it had some sensitive readings of her texts, like Paul's Case for example. I didn't find him harsh or disrespectful; I mostly agree that his analysis of her overall themes, particularly that aspect of transcendence that her fiction is in search of, in refusal of the profit-driven morass of the changing times. 4y

Lcsmcat @batsy I didn‘t find Kates disrespectful, but just a little too sure of himself sometimes. He did point out some of the same themes that we have been discussing over the past years. (Has it been years?) 4y

batsy @Lcsmcat Sorry, I was responding to @Graywacke 's comment there re: a more respectful writer. I understand that Kates being so sure of his position is somewhat annoying, but I think most literary critics tend to stake out their position in that manner (& proceed to argue with other critics 😆) And I guess it has been years? That's pretty amazing. 4y

Lcsmcat @batsy No need to apologize! I like the back and forth. And he was writing in the 1950s, so I try to cut some slack, but he was a bit patronizing towards her, I thought. Not quite allowing her to be a full complicated human. Which is a pet peeve of mine. 🤷🏻‍♀️ 4y

Lcsmcat @batsy On the similarity between the palace and the cliff dwellings, it didn‘t hit me until I was hunting online for a photo of the palace. But then it jumped out. I read that when she visited Avignon she was there with the guide and her friend and no one else - crowds of tourists weren‘t around - so it would have seemed as deserted as,Mesa Verde, too. I‘m not sure what to make of that. 4y

Graywacke @batsy I would roughly say what @Lcsmcat said as an explanation to why I felt it wasn‘t respectful. He writes as a critic of a female writer, not of a writer. (And he oversimplifies. Not enough noticed the dominant pull Europe exerted on her work... ?? That‘s his thesis?) 4y

Lcsmcat So @Graywacke @CarolynM @batsy @jewright @Louise @Sace @Tamra @Suet624 @arubabookwoman @Currey @catebutler @Catherine_Willoughby @crazeedi @mdm139 @Tanisha_A @emilyhaldi @rubyslippersreads @KathyWheeler , where do we go from here? There‘s the novel we skipped, (tagged) and we‘ve played with the idea of a biography or biographies. Any thoughts?

Alexander's Bridge

Graywacke I‘m thinking two things. First I think Alexander‘s Bridge makes a nice next book. (But I‘m ok with anything). Second, what do we do after Cather? Does this group want to look at another author? Someone outside Litsy praised Edith Wharton to me. I‘ve never read her. Of course similar era, but Wharton was (an embittered?) part of the wealthier class. But it‘s just an idea. https://www.edithwharton.org/discover/published-works/ 4y

CarolynM Sorry everyone, I completely forgot this weekend 😳😩 I'll try to catch up in the next day or two. As to where to next, I think we need to read Alexander's Bridge for completeness. Also, my ebook Cather collection includes a volume called Not Under Forty, which seems to be essays. Would anyone else be interested in reading that? I am definitely interested in Edith Wharton @Graywacke I've not read her either, but I've long wanted to. 4y

arubabookwoman I'm also interested in Wharton. Similar era, but I think very different than Cather. I think most of her novels were set in the time contemporary to when she was writing. (No HF). And though she herself was of the wealthy classes, (and many of her books are set in that milieu), many of her novels feature the "lower" classes, as well as those living in genteel poverty. 4y

Graywacke @arubabookwoman my only worry with Wharton is if we will lose our nature connection and miss it. Cather‘s connection to the landscape was very special and a very attractive aspect of her writing. Wharton sounds very society. But perhaps so were most novels from Austen to Woolf (i‘ve read very little of all that, so...just kind blindly saying that without having any idea if it‘s true.) 4y

Graywacke @CarolynM I‘m interested in Not Under 40. Of course I was born around 80 years too late to fit that “not” in the title. 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke @CarolynM @arubabookwoman If we want to keep the Cather nature/setting strength, perhaps Jane Smiley or Ivan Doig would be worth exploring. I‘m up for Wharton too, but she is much more about society and its hierarchy than natural settings. 4y

Lcsmcat @CarolynM @Graywacke I‘m curious about Not Under Forty too. 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat you remind me you brought up that I should read Eudora Welty. Just tossing that name out there. Or Virginia Woolf - all I have read is A Room of One‘s Own. 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke Both excellent choices also. We could keep this going for years. 😀 4y

arubabookwoman @Graywacke @Lcsmcat You are right. In my memory of Wharton her novels are not about nature, landscape, setting. I didn't realize that was what the object was. I guess I was thinking early 20th century novelists, female. I know Wharton's considered "society" but I think she focuses much more on individuals rather than society. I've never read Doig, and will admit I don't get on with V.Woolf (but maybe I need to revisit now that I'm older). ???? (edited) 4y

arubabookwoman I like Welty, but her focus is entirely Southern. She does remind me a bit of Faulkner, who I love, but a bit easier to read. And I like what I've read of Smiley, but I'm not sure I'd put her in the same "classic" category as the other authors mentioned. 4y

Lcsmcat @arubabookwoman As far as I‘m concerned the object is to read good books and talk about them. I‘m open to any era, any author, as long as they are well-written works. 4y

Graywacke @arubabookwoman like @Lcsmcat said, just good books. I only brought up nature in case it that aspect was that specifically interested anyone. Wharton sounds like a best choice so far - for us 4 anyway. I‘m really interested in learning about her and reading her work. (edited) 4y

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Lcsmcat

Collected Stories | Willa Cather

Enchanted Bluff and Tom Outland‘s Story. Both concerned with cliff dwellers and the white man‘s reaction to them. Tom is a reread for those who have been with us from the beginning, but in rereading our comments about it from The Professor‘s House I found we didn‘t focus on Tom, so maybe some new perspectives here. As always @chris.wolak gave us lots to think about in her blog posts. Like the double meaning of “bluff” in the first story.

Lcsmcat #catherbuddyread Also the nonfiction Cather wrote about Mesa Verde here: https://cather.unl.edu/writings/nonfiction/nf057 (edited) 4y

Lcsmcat Both these stories struck me as being more about the past being better than the present than about one culture being better than another. I‘ve got two quotes from Tom that I want to throw out there for discussion that we didn‘t focus on last time. 4y

Lcsmcat “He was the sort of fellow who can do anything for somebody else, and nothing for himself. There are lots like that among working-men. They aren‘t trained by success to a sort of systematic selfishness.” 4y

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Lcsmcat “Rodney explained that he knew I cared about the things, and was proud of them, but he‘d always supposed I meant to ‘realize‘ on them, just as he did, and that it would come to money in the end. ‘Everything does,‘ he added.” 4y

Suet624 @Lcsmcat What a quote about the working man who does things for others! I know both types of people. (edited) 4y

Currey @Lcsmcat I did think when I read the second quote while reading the story that it was very human to believe that others understand your motives and intuit your desires without your having to express them. The failure here is not that Rodney sold off his findings but that he did not deeply understand Tom‘s needs. 4y

Graywacke I was surprised how much I enjoyed re-reading the Tom Outland. The end obscured everything for me. I had forgotten how well she fleshed out the beginning - the gambling, Rodney‘s personality, the cow herding on the grassland - the town armpit vs the natural purity and its impact on Tom‘s mentality. 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat you‘re sharp to pick up her golden age themes. Everything was better in 1890 than in these money focused times. Very subtle here - i hadn‘t fully noticed - but yeah, it‘s there. I love those quotes, especially the 1st sentence in the first one. - it‘s a nice sentiment, but also it works so well in the meter, so to speak. It all comes down to one word, and needing the context. (edited) 4y

Graywacke @Currey i was thinking how in the whole story of personal refreshment, we assume Tom was speaking for everyone. But it turns out we readers were wrong (or, at least this one was). Tom was only speaking for himself. Rodney was just working. That hit me. 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat “the houses of the Pueblo Indians to-day and of their ancestors on the Mesa Verde are a reproach to the messiness in which we live.” From the essay. Thanks for linking. 4y

Graywacke On TEB - I liked Arthur Adams. “When I had talked with him for an hour and heard him laugh again, I wondered how it was that when nature had taken such pains with a man, from his hands to the arch of his long foot, she had ever lost him in Sandtown” 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke Such a great quote about Adams! 4y

Lcsmcat @Currey We all know this intellectually, which is why it resonates. And yet it‘s so difficult for us to act this way! I had so much more sympathy for Rodney this time around. And, like Tom. I want to know what happened to him! 4y

Currey @Graywacke Good point about the assumption that Tom was speaking for everyone. Rodney was not even just working, he thought he was working for a common goal. 4y

Currey @Graywacke @Lcsmcat Yes, really great quote on Adams. So visual and cerebral at the same time 4y

batsy @Graywacke I was just going to come here to post that quote about Adams. There is a kind of underlying heartache in Cather's stories about these unique and sensitive characters lost to the circumstances of their time or the place they can't escape from. 4y

Lcsmcat @batsy Do you think that‘s why the “time jump” at the end works? Because it increases the pathos? And do you think it was all a “bluff” or did the boys, as they grew to men, think that someday they would make it to the bluff? 4y

Lcsmcat BTW, if you haven‘t been to Mesa Verde, add it to your bucket list! We took the kids there about 15 years ago and it was so much more than you get from a photo. Breathtaking! 4y

Graywacke @batsy yes, heartache. He‘s beautiful and also lost. 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat i want to say something on the “time jump”. The bluff is essentially a fantasy (a life bluff, as Chris sort a noted) because they will never get there. It maybe represents child‘s fantasy about their future life. And so, maybe, by jumping ahead and removing the magic, exposing the bland futures they actually have, she exposes the gap between the fantasy and reality, childhood optimism and adult reality. Maybe not, also. 4y

batsy @Lcsmcat That time jump is something Cather uses to emphasise pathos & I do like the yearning wistfulness of it; there's always the sense of the search for something transcendental. I feel like the narrator & Tip are still the romantics in that sense. I'd like to think they (and little Bert) are still attempting to get to the bluff. And it's telling that the boys who might not be as keen still are the ones who ventured into finance & business. 4y

batsy @Lcsmcat Though I just might be reading into it a bit too much there :) 4y

Lcsmcat @batsy @Graywacke Good points, both of you, on the time jump. Cather does both romanticize childhood and denigrate (too strong a word, but I can‘t think of another right now) the business/banking world. Wistful is a great word to describe that story. 4y

Graywacke @batsy interesting comment, all of it. It is telling. @Lcsmcat romanticize childhood? Seems obvious now that you said it. But I hadn‘t picked up in that before. (Sorry for the 9 hr later response. Travel day 😕) 4y

CarolynM I thought TEB was a really lovely story. @Graywacke @batsy @Lcsmcat Picking up your points about yearning and romanticising childhood, it made me think that maybe Cather's nostalgia is as much for lost youth as for past times. How you see the world, what seems important to you, what seems possible are all so different at different stages of life. A lot of her work examines that gap between childhood and the mature person. (edited) 4y

batsy @CarolynM Nicely said and I agree. That's maybe why her artist characters continue to struggle with the world; the qualities of being a child (openness, wonder, possibility) that they need to cultivate stand in (increasing) contrast to the age of industrialisation and finance. 4y

CarolynM @batsy Thank you. I hadn't thought to take it that step further, but I think you're right. 4y

Lcsmcat @CarolynM @batsy That‘s a great insight. Her artists are driven, but they are also child-like in the ways you mention. We all commented on the yearning for lost youth when we read The Professor‘s House, but I can see it in other works now too. Niel in Lost Lady missed more his impression of Mrs. F than who she actually was; Jim in Antonia; Cecile in Shadows on the Rock. They all had a yearning for the past quality. 4y

Lcsmcat @CarolynM @batsy @Graywacke The Cather archives has images of TEB in its original publication here https://cather.unl.edu/writings/shortfiction/ss001 I don‘t know how much control, if any, Cather had over the illustrations, but they‘re VERY nostalgic. 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat hi. In case you missed them, check your email for my last one. 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke 👍🏻 4y

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Lcsmcat

Collected Stories | Willa Cather

#alone #quotsyapr21 @TK-421

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Graywacke

Collected Stories | Willa Cather

This week we look at the two last stories Cather completed.
#catherbuddyread

The Best Years, written for her brother in 1945, looks at Evangeline Knightly‘s experiences with a bright teenage teacher in rural Nebraska. Before Breakfast (1944) covers Henry Grenfell‘s emotional swings alone on Grand Manan Island, Nova Scotia

This completes The Old Beauty and Others. Next - one week off then @Lcsmcat leads the selection from Five Stories (1956)

Graywacke I found @chris.wolak ‘s posts really helpful this week. https://chriswolak.com/2020/05/13/may-2020-reminder-for-the-willa-cather-short-s...

https://chriswolak.com/2020/05/27/response-to-the-best-years-the-willa-cather-sh... 4y

Graywacke https://chriswolak.com/2020/06/10/june-2020-reminder-for-the-willa-cather-short-...

https://chriswolak.com/2020/06/24/response-to-before-breakfast-the-willa-cather-... 4y

Graywacke Personally, i was shocked by the first story, but then forgot about it as I read about Henry‘s troubles and enjoyed the language Cather used to describe it. Of course, Henry regathers himself in a nice moment before coming home to breakfast. Thoughts? 4y

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Graywacke @Lcsmcat @CarolynM @batsy @jewright @Louise @Sace @Tamra @Suet624 @arubabookwoman @Currey @catebutler @Catherine_Willoughby @crazeedi @mdm139 @Tanisha_A @emilyhaldi @rubyslippersreads @KathyWheeler of course let me know if you want off or on this list. 4y

Lcsmcat One of the things that popped out at me in Before Breakfast: he was reading law in CO when he met his wife, who was from NY people. But he‘s in bonds now (which I took to be insurance or finance, not law) and on the East coast, given his island retreat. So is his alienation from family because his mother in law (who always got her way) got him into a different job (family business?) and state and basically controlled how his life turned out? 👇🏻 4y

Lcsmcat 👆🏻 Why else would his “private life” be separate from his “family life?” 4y

Lcsmcat In the first, I was surprised by Leslie‘s death, but by the time I finished the story it was clear that it wasn‘t her story. I‘m not sure it was Miss Knightly‘s either. It seemed more to belong to an era than a character and, like, Beauty, to be about the passing of time and who deals with it well and who doesn‘t. I loved Ms. Knightly as a character, but Molly (the horse) might be my favorite. 😀 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat “bonds” has two meanings. 🙂 (And his marriage was a kind of wreck, literally founded on one.) but he does seem to like to work. Honestly, I neglected thinking that part through. i was too stuck on “everything that was shut up in him, under lock and bolt and pressure, simply broke jail, spread out into the spaciousness of the night, undraped, unashamed” 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke Good point about bonds! And the quote? If he liked hard work (which I agree with you on) then what was shut up under lock and bolt and pressure? It felt to me like that was because he was living a life that wasn‘t authentic. That quote about only being your true self when no one is looking - it made me feel that a major part of his life was spent living someone else‘s values. Like Mrs. Fergusson‘s new house that was her husband‘s taste. 4y

batsy I really enjoyed The Bright Years. It felt like a wiser, sadder, more mature Laura Ingalls Wilder story! I was surprised by Leslie's death too & felt a missed opportunity for a story of female friendship between her & Miss Knightly. But I loved the depiction of Leslie's relationship with her brothers & their upstairs world: "a story in itself, a secret romance". Particularly poignant since Cather based it on her own relationship with her brother. 4y

batsy The second story struck me mainly in terms of how much more I'd like to get to know the geologist's daughter! She seems fascinating. Also the painterly language and vivid description of her bathing that was probably a reference to Botticelli's Venus? I have to think some more about what I thought about Grenfell; that quote struck me, too @Graywacke 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat @batsy - on TBY - it felt to me to be about an era, mostly, too. The time shift from buggy to car, from knights (er, Knightly), to Wanda Bliss (!!). Poor Molly has been become obsolete. And Cather gets in her point about the shallower new era, even if Mrs. k is more kind about it. And, I like that quote, @batsy. Sibling affection, homeness, is really meaningful here. 4y

Graywacke Any thoughts on that barbed wire? Mrs. K‘s note that they are less visible and nicer to the view does not erase the fact that they fundamentally change and contain the wildness of the landscape and of where ms. k can roam. It‘s unspoken - invisible barriers. Important here? (Perhaps, for example, a reference to gender roles, or marriage, or... ) (edited) 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat i think your feeling is spot on. The more I think about it the more I think about that lie of life. We do and do and it distracts us from all the other stuff in life. He works because that‘s how he got ahead, and now that‘s how he escapes his family and self-fulfillment. He just chases blindly, he‘s escaping himself. And that‘s part of his morning catharsis. (To answer @chris.wolak ‘s question - I don‘t think it will change him one bit.) 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat oops. Last post was, of course, on BB. 4y

Graywacke @batsy on BB - Surely we don‘t get to know a goddess. 🙂 Our Venus, this daughter, must remain distant and mysterious and worth some reflection. ?? I LOVED, all caps, the little geological element. If he‘s right, the rocks are Cretaceous. Wait... i can look this up! (web 🤿 ... ) 4y

Graywacke http://magnificentrocks-rochesmagnifique.ca/the_periods-les_periodes/permian_tri... Cambrian = 541 to 485 million years ago (ma), Triassic 245-201 ma (these basalts should be closer to 201 ma). 😁☺️ 4y

Graywacke http://earth2geologists.net/grandmanangeology/GM_Bedrock_Map_2013_modified_JGM.p... (yellow, greens, blues and grays are Cambrian. Peaches and pinks Triassic) 4y

Graywacke (Hopefully us Shakespeare readalong peeps picked up on the Henry VI reference. For Shakespeare, Hvi marked the end of the era of chivalry and the beginning of cut-throat power plays. That is a near perfect parallel for Cather‘s WWI - or, as she preferred, her 1922. Glenfell is living cut-throat capitalism, but grew up in more heroic pioneer Colorado. Anyway, links us into tomorrow... 😁) (edited) 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke While H VI would be a great parallel, the play in the story is actually HenryIV. So I read it as the father-son difficulty. G just doesn‘t get his son and his son doesn‘t get him. 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke re the barbed wire - I love your idea that it represents unspoken barriers. Miss K. is so independent, but in the end she ends up Mrs. somebody. But Mrs. F saying she can‘t call her that could also point to some (mild) subversion. PEO (which I‘ve never seen in a story before!) was newish then and is dedicated to higher education for women. So Mr. F wasn‘t the only progressive one. 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat vi iv —- 🙈🤦🏻‍♂️ thanks. (Now I have to wonder about Falstaff...) 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke I also appreciate the geologist‘s insight into that part of the story. Like G. that isn‘t what I read for pleasure so it helps to have your interpretation. (But I won‘t lose sleep over it. 😂) 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke There‘s a reason we use Arabic numerals! Did you catch the Pilgrims Progress reference, too? Cather was dropping literary references left and right! 4y

Lcsmcat @batsy More mature Wilder is a great comparison! Leslie‘s relationship with her brothers was great, but it felt a bit like it was being used to point out the lack of relationship with her father. It makes me curious about Cather‘s relationship with her father. There seem to be a lot of “disconnected” fathers in her fiction. 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat PEO? 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke I could tell you what it stands for but then I‘d have to kill you. 😂 We‘re an organization that raises money to send women to college, or to graduate school, owns a women‘s college in Missouri, and supports education for women. Started by 7 girls at a small college in Iowa in 1869, we‘re now world-wide. 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat endangering my life, I looked it up. Cool that it‘s mentioned here (and that it exists). 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke It made me wonder if 1) Cather was a PEO, and 2) if “Methodist Win-a-Couple” was real. (And if so, what the H was it?) 4y

Currey I was happy while reading The Bright Years because as @batsy said, it was a wiser version of Wilder and really seemed to capture a balance between a sentimental attachment to the past versus being stuck in the past. I was not surprised by Leslie‘s death as how soon it happened. However, like @Graywacke I largely forgot about it when reading Breakfast. 4y

Currey @Lcsmcat Good insight about fathers. The father son relationship in Breakfast is obviously strained by having no shared foundation on which to understand each other. I did totally love the fact that he didn‘t have to rescue the daughter and I was happy that he realized it. 4y

Lcsmcat @Currey Yes, it was great that he realized it before she had to be aware of his impulse. 4y

batsy @Lcsmcat That's a good point about fathers in her fiction. Maybe Neighbour Rosicky is one significant departure from her usual stories? The connection with his daughter-in-law that might be a version of a father-daughter relationship that Cather saw as ideal. 4y

batsy @Graywacke Ah yes, good point! The mystique and allure will be gone if we got to know her better. I picked up on the Henry IV reference too and perked up a bit :) It does seem interesting in the sense that it's a play about competing masculine (patriarchal) interests and that seems to be an underlying concern for Grenfell. 4y

batsy @Graywacke Thanks for the links about rocks; I have a bit of a nerdy interest in geology 😆 4y

CarolynM I don't have much to add here. I enjoyed TBY, I saw it as largely a story about change. We often here about the pace of change in the modern world, it was interesting to consider how much difference the move from horses to cars made in that 15 year period. BB left me a bit cold. I like the various references highlighted in the comments here but I didn't pick them up. I was interested that the absent father motif appears in both stories, but👇 4y

CarolynM ☝️examined from different perspectives. In TBY it leaves the mother isolated and looking backwards rather than forwards once her children are no longer dependant on her, while in BB the father is shown as the isolated one, unable to share enjoyment (holidays, entertainments) with his wife or children. 4y

Lcsmcat @batsy I agree that Rosicky is an exception. He‘s an engaged, loving father. She has others who are engaged but not loving, and loving but not engaged, so they‘re not one-size-fits-all by any means. 4y

Lcsmcat @CarolynM The pace of change really picked up in this era, didn‘t it? My grandparents went from riding a mule to school to seeing the space shuttle, and all that came between. I often think, even with all the changes I have seen, that generation had the most head-spinning rate of change of any. 4y

Lcsmcat @batsy “competing masculin (patriarchal) interests” Yes - you manage to say things so clearly while I‘m stumbling around the edges of an idea. (edited) 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat couldn‘t find anything on “Methodist Win-a-couple”. Although googling “Methodist” and “couple” together does overwhelm the results with the Methodist gay marriage split. 4y

Graywacke @Currey @Lcsmcat @batsy @CarolynM we saw in Old Mrs. Harris that Cather‘s father might have had some oddball undesirable characteristics, and I think we are seeing more in TBY. Keep in mind that part of the divide in BB is because the father and son are of different eras and their strain represents that, to a degree. Overall - 4y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke You thought the strain between G and son was the era? Hm. His “I‘m glad my hands are grubby” line meant that the divide was more based on self-made man vs. easy-life son. Which was slightly related to the era, but more related to the social differences between husband and wife. I‘ll have to think about this. 4y

Graywacke @batsy @Lcsmcat hmm. Glenfell, Hiv and “competing masculin (patriarchal) interests”. I don‘t have much to add her except to say, thanks for highlighting. Thinking. 4y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat pioneer principled heroes and their spoiled ruthless materialistic children. 🙂 Yes, my mind is hanging on that. Another on A Lost Lady theme. 4y

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