“O Pioneers” by Willa Cather follows a group of frontiersmen trying to survive in the harsh conditions of the untamed west. The story follows the Bergsons, but more descriptively, the main character, a girl named Alexandra Bergson. Throughout the story, Alexandra grows up to her full potential and we are able to see her character just as rich and as mesmerizing as Willa hoped to achieve. This is the character that Willa decides to revolve her story around and makes the reader fully understand who
An American Woman In the story “O Pioneers!” by Willa Cather presents a young intelligent woman who had an American dream. Alexandra Bergson is a perfect model of emotional strength, strong-will and courage. She not only motivated herself but she always had a drive to encourage others to never give up on their dream. Building up the land, having more patience and passion than men, and self-sacrifice were some conditions Alexandra Bergson faced as a young woman. Overall, all of the obstacles she
O Pioneers by Willa Cather is a different novel from those of its time. It is a novel that stands for women equality represented by the main character Alexandra. O Pioneers reveals a story about Alexandra’s struggle against nature and being a strong woman in a male dominated profession and society. She succeeded in establishing her female identity and achieved a sense of female self-fulfillment by transforming the wild land and struggling for her equal rights with men. This paper focuses on the feminist
allusion in O Pioneers is the one made to the 101st Psalm. This allusion can be seen when Ivar repeats the verse in part five, chapter one. In the verse, David gives his guidelines for living life. In olden times this scripture held the utmost importance, as many people memorized it and implemented David’s guidelines in their own lives. This scripture expanded on the novel’s theme of Christianity and drew my interest because I have similar views as some of the characters. Willa Cather cleverly alluded
O Pioneers by Willa Cather sets itself apart from other novels of its time because of what its stands for, feminism. It exemplifies women’s equality, represented by the main character, Alexandra, by showing her survival in a male dominated society. She succeeded in building her female identity and achieved a sense of female attainment by revolutionizing the wild land and struggling for her equal rights with all that surrounded her. This paper focuses on the feminist thoughts and the positive attitude
traditional jobs such as taking care of children, having children, making food, making clothes, etc. Pioneer times in America were no different as men took care of farming while women stayed indoors. Alexandra Bergson from Willa Cather’s O’ Pioneers is portrayed as an ideal pioneer woman from the 1880’s. Alexandra’s yearning to achieve what a man could, ownership of property,
contribution, as it is creates the entire backdrop of their experiences -- socially, economically, and politically. A psychoanalytical look at O Pioneers! by Willa Cather, explains how the social and cultural implications of Willa’s life are transferred to this piece of literature. I believe that Willa Cather created the primary, male characters in O Pioneers! based on the unfortunate experiences she had with men in her early adulthood, which caused these strongly biased characters, while the female
book for our time, and that did help a little bit, however I was not nearly as excited about the novel as I am about Willa Cather’s life. I find the narration of the story to be in third person, I didn’t quite understood to what capacity though. I did understand that from what point an individual was talking and that was someone else telling this families story. The setting in O Pioneers was in a small town called Hanover in the state of Nebraska. Which I found extremely interesting
O Pioneers!: The Land and the American Dream It seems that everything in Willa Cather’s O Pioneers!, aside from the land, starts out so full of life and ends so utterly devoid of it. It could even be said that the characters in the novel become imprisoned by their own lives. Marie is barred by her love, which, in the end, leaves her quite literally lifeless. Alexandra, who initially is so full of life, begins to view her life as unimportant and as a prison house. Even the spirituality of the pioneers
Willa Cather, a ninteenth century American female writer, used her childhood experiences growing up on the great plains of Nebraska to write about a woman named Alexandra Bergson and her struggles on her family’s farm on the Nebraskan frontier in the book, O Pioneers! (. The narrator follows Alexandra throughout her life, and shows how she became successful while overcoming the patriarchy. On the other hand, Cather also wrote about a young, somewhat confused girl named Marie Tovesky, who found