O Pioneers! is a novel which tells the story of a family of Swedish immigrants, the Bergsons, who in rural Nebraska during the early 20th-century. The narrative focuses primarily on Alexandra Bergson, who is left in charge of the farm and her younger brothers after the death of her father, and on her younger brother Emil. The story follows Alexandra and Emil's romantic relationships and Alexandra's struggles to run the farm while exploring themes of isolation, temptation, and marriage.
Alexandra Bergson The novels protagonist Alexandra Bergson is a model of emotional strength courage and resolve As the eldest child of the Swedish immigrant John Bergson she inherits his farm and makes it profitable Particularly suited to the toil of prairie life she is a prototype of the strong American pioneer and an embodiment of the untamed American West Creating Civilization in the Wild If as Cather famouly claimed the land is the hero of O Pioneers then the novel is fundamentally a story
Life on the American Plains as a Source of Wholeness and Self Sufficiency in My ntonia Willa Cather born in Virginia in 1873 moved to the Nebraska Divide when she was nine years old and then later to Red Cloud Nebraska Her memories of her time in Nebraska and the frontier life she both experienced and observed greatly impacted her writing Although Ms Cather did well as a writer her novels O Pioneers 1913 Song of the Lark 1915 and My ntonia 1918 about heroines of the western frontier led to her