Title: The stuff of our forebears
First published: 1998
Description: Beginning with an examination of Cather's Virginia childhood and the Southern influences that continued to mold her during the Nebraska years, McDonald traces the effects of those influences in several of Cather's novels. The patterns that emerge are often surprising. They reveal not only Cather's strong ideological connection to the pastoral but also the political position implicit in her choice of that particular mode.

Further analysis of Cather's work reveals her preoccupation with hierarchical constructs and with the use and abuse of power, along with her interest in order, control, and possession. The Willa Cather who emerges from the pages of The Stuff of Our Forebears is not the Cather who claimed to eschew politics but a far more political novelist than has heretofore been perceived.
Subjects: American Pastoral fiction, Country life in literature, History, History and criticism, In literature, Knowledge, Pastoral fiction, American, Women and literature, Roman pastoral américain, Critique et interprétation, Landleben <Motiv>, Et les États-Unis (Sud), Histoire, Histoire et critique, Vie rurale dans la littérature, Rezeption, Femmes et littérature, États-Unis (Sud) dans la littérature, Cather, willa, 1873-1947, Pastoral literature, history and criticism, Southern states, in literature, Southern States
Places: Southern States
People: Willa Cather (1873-1947)
Time periods: 20th century
LC classification: PS3505.A87 Z737 1998