The Song of the Lark (The Great Plains Trilogy) - Softcover

Willa Silbert Cather; Sherill Harbinson

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0141181044 ISBN 13: 9780141181042

Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group, 1999

Synopsis

Beautiful and lyrical, this third novel by Willa Cather follows the life of Thea Kronberg from her childhood in 19th-century Nebraska to her career as a renowned opera singer.

Since the time of its publication in 1915, this novel had captivated readers with its sharp observations, shimmering descriptions, sly humor, and its provocative heroine—a feisty young woman who strives to create her own destiny, regardless of social restrictions.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

About this title

From the Inside Flap

"The time will come when she will be ranked above Hemingway." --Leon Edel

In this powerful portrait of the self-making of an artist, Willa Cather created one of her most extraordinary heroines. Thea Kronborg, a minister's daughter in a provincial Colorado town, seems destined from childhood for a place in the wider world. But as her path to the world stage leads her ever farther from the humble town she can't forget and from the man she can't afford to love, Thea learns that her exceptional musical talent and fierce ambition are not enough.
It is in the solitude of a tiny rock chamber high in the side of an Arizona cliff--"a cleft in the heart of the world"--that Thea comes face to face with her own dreams and desires, stripped clean by the haunting purity of the ruined cliff dwellings and inspired by the whisperings of their ancient dust. Here she finds the courage to seize her future and to use her gifts to catch "the shining, elusive element that is life itself--life hurrying past us and running away, too strong to stop, too sweet to lose." In prose as shimmering and piercingly true as the light in a desert canyon, Cather takes us into the heart of a woman coming to know her deepest self.

About the Author

Willa Cather (1873-1947) was born in Virginia and raised on a Nebraska ranch. She is known for her beautifully evocative short stories and novels about the American West. Cather became the managing editor for McClure’s Magazine in 1906 and lived for forty years in New York City with her companion Edith Lewis. In 1922 Cather won the Pulitzer Prize for One of Ours, the story of a Western boy in World War I. In 1933 she was awarded the Prix Femina Americaine “for distinguished literary accomplishments.”

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0141181044
• ISBN 13: 9780141181042
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 480