num_pages: 167
description: Marian Forrester is the symbolic flower of the Old American West. She draws her strength from that solid foundation, bringing delight and beauty to her elderly husband, to the small town of Sweet Water where they live, to the prairie land itself, and to the young narrator of her story, Neil Herbert. All are bewitched by her brilliance and grace, and all are ultimately betrayed. For Marian longs for "life on any terms," and in fulfilling herself, she loses all she loved and all who loved her. This, Willa Cather's most perfect novel, is not only a portrait of a troubling beauty, but also a haunting evocation of a noble age slipping irrevocably into the past.
language: English
title: A Lost Lady
titlecomplete: A Lost Lady
characters: Mr Forrester, Ivy Peters, Niel Herbert, Mrs Forrester
genres: Read For School, 20th Century, American, Historical Fiction, Historical, Literary Fiction, Novels, Literature, Classics, Fiction
ratings_count: 6777
places: Nebraska
publisher: Virago