
Reviewing the book in The Smart Set, H.L. Membership includes a 10% discount on all editing orders.When Willa Cather’s fifth novel, One of Ours, won the Pulitzer Prize in 1923, it was divisive among critics. This premium content, “Members Only” section of the site! Guide PDFs and quizzes, 10971 literature essays, When Jim conveys, “this was the road over which Ántonia and I came on that night when we got off the train at Black Hawk and were bedded down. He never has reason to be concerned, with a financially satisfied, happy, and fortunate family. Jim lives his younger years biased by the honest happiness that comes with being a child. The epigraph’s nostalgic tone anticipates a harsh juxtaposition between Jim’s romanticized childhood and Ántonia’s satisfaction with her lifestyle.


On the contrary, Ántonia is satisfied and content with her life, as misfortune humbles her. As an adult, he glamorizes his adolescent past a realistic point in order to avoid the inevitable future. This reality steers Jim to be constantly stuck in the past, escaping from the present. While Jim has a fruitful childhood filled with remiss optimism for the future, his ultimate fate is to lead a bland adult life. The classic adage translates to “the best days are the first to flee”, which perfectly expresses My Ántonia’s general themes of longing, perception of the past, and fondness of memory.

This simple yet powerful statement is the quote chosen by Willa Cather to set the expectational theme for her 1918 novel My Ántonia. My Antonia The Contrasting Effects of Jim's and Ántonia’s Perceptions of the Past Abbey Crowley 9th Grade

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