Willa Cather

The Song of the Lark "Annotated" Willa Cather

The Song of the Lark is a 1915 novel by Willa Cather. It is the second part of a thematic trilogy by Cather which tells stories of women in the emerging prairies of the American West. The trilogy is considered to be some of Cather's finest work, celebrated for bringing to life the rural West and its people in a way that had never been done before. The book follows the life of Thea Kronborg as she grows up in a small American prairie town and follows her ambition to be an internationally renowned singer. Thea's story is a combination of Cather's own autobiographical experiences growing up in Nebraska and the life of a famous Scandinavian-American opera singer named Olive Fremstad. The novel is divided into six parts. The first one recounts Thea's childhood in the fictional town of Moonstone, Colorado. When the book starts, she is eleven years old. She is the daughter of the local minister and has a reputation for being different and aloof. Though the adults in her family, particularly her mother and eccentric Aunt Tillie, are supportive of her, she has trouble getting along with her siblings and other children. She takes daily piano lessons for two to four hours a day.