O Pioneer! and A Wagner Matinée

Willa Cathar was a women author in the 1800s. She wrote a lot about the west and prairie farmlands as she was born and grew up there. Willa adds a distinctively Midwest feel to her writing in the way she describes the setting. All of his scenery in her stories are exquisite and help provide the reader with a feel of being there with the main character. most of Cathar's work did have to do with Nebraska, where she grew up. This makes her a regionalist author. Regionalism is a type of writing where the author would focus on a specific area they knew the most about like Cathar and Nebraska, it is where she grew up so she knows the most about that area and how to ebst write about it. O Pioneer! is the story of a family of immigrants who become farmers. They work hard but they never really become truly wealthy or secure financially. But when the patriarch of the family dies he does something truly unheard of, he leaves the farm to his eldest daughter rather than her three brothers as most people of the time would have done. (Cathar) Under the daughters frugality and intelligence the farm begins to prosper. As the farm does better and better everyone else in the family gets married. Alexandra has been so busy with the farm that when she gets a chance at love she is leaping at the idea when suddenly tragedy strikes. Her youngest brother, the only one in the family to be raised while the farm was doing better, dies and it is a tragedy. (Cathar) In A Wagner Matinée Cathar is once again the author. A Wagner Matinée is about Cathar more personally as it has to do with her aunt and uncle moving to Nebraska when the Homestead act is passed. It details their hardships, successes, failures and life in general. This story really adds to the idea she was a regionalism writer. The story is definitely changed by the setting and how the setting changes everyone. For instance how hard it is to predict rainfall in the area the story is set. This affects the main character by providing cheap labor form men who had a bad crop year. (Cathar). I thought that Cathar's regionalism actually added tot he story, which can be a tricky thing to do. Some times authors who are regionalsits may write TOO area specific tot he point they casually reference ares or saying that are not as well known around the country as they are in that region. for example if I were to write about Springfield I could not just casually mention a horseshoe I would have to explain it because even though some people might know what im talking about not everyone would. Overall I thought that Cathar's writing style was very good and enjoyable to read even if it was a little on the mopey and sad side of things sometimes during the stories.

Cather, Willa. "O' Pioneers." Glencoe Literature. Comp. Jeffery D. Wilhelm. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw Hill, 2009. 489. Print.