I picked up O Pioneers! this past weekend as part of goal I set for myself, which is currently (not so cleverly) called Ten in Ten. Over the remaining ten months of 2007 I plan to read ten books I have had on my shelves for over a year- in addition to my normal reading. The first of which was O Pioneers! Needless to say, I am pretty excited about this. I have more books than I would like to admit that have been collecting dust for sometime now-and this is a fun way to pick up those books I have always wanted to have read but never really felt like reading. As for my reaction to O Pioneers!--well to begin with there is an exclamation mark in the title and that is just awesome. I think of this book as high school reading, and by that I mean, it is often required that highschooler's read it. Which is a damn shame. If I had read it in high school I know I would not have appreciated it at all, instead I am sure I would have found it boring and pointless. As it is, I have been out of high school for quite sometime, and I have to admit: I loved it! The characters, the long crafted speeches about the land, the heartbreak, I felt as though I was allowed in to this part of history that was formerly not open to me...and now I have some sense of how people lived and thought in the early 20th century. I should say, at no point did I feel I could empathize with the characters but Cather's prose really brought the time period alive. And for that, I am thankful. Not to mention, its so short there really isn't anytime to not like it.As for the remaining 9 in 10, I plan to read:
Heart of the Matter
All the Pretty Horses
My Antonia
Big Rock Candy Mountain
White Noise
The Street Of Crocodiles
The Sea, The Sea
A Handful of Dust
& Cold Mountain
6 comments:
I just read "Song of the Lark". Okay, okay, I almost finished it but collapsed. You're right about the lack of empathy towards the characters. Isn't that strange? She seems very business like about her characters.
I watched a documentary PBS put out about her (yay for libraries) and O Pioneers! was named from one of Whitman's poems, "Pioneers, O Pioneers!". Maybe you already know that but I thought it was damn cool.
Streets of Crocodiles? Madness. Of course, I only know what I learned from watching The Quay Brothers' fantastic short film, which is to say, I know nothing about it.
I haven't read Song of the Lark, but I did read that Cather thought that My Antonia was by far her best work--so don't give up on her completely until you try that one.
SPOLIER ALERT:
As far as the ending goes, I don't understand Alexandra wanting to part her brother's murderer and blame it all on a young girl. It makes me thankful to not be living in her day and age. Anyone have any thoughts on that?
Also, I just found out that Cather was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1923 for her novel about World War I, called One of Ours. Have any of you even heard of this novel? Cause I haven't.
I thought that Henry Thomas was pretty good in All the Pretty Horses. Of coarse he was completely over shadowed by the force that is Matt Damon.
And as for Cold Mountain, who doesn't want to read about Nicole Kidman, Jude Law, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Natalie Portman. Even Renee Zellweger if you're into that sort of thing.
By the way did you know that in 2002 Portman was named Peta's Sexiest Female Vegetarian.
I did quit reading Cold Mtn last time for the movie...but I don't own every film under the sun like some people....
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