Willa Cather Biography

Willa Cather, Author
Born asWilla Sibert Cather
Occup.Author
FromUSA
BornDecember 7, 1873
Gore, Virginia near Winchester, Virginia
DiedApril 24, 1947
New York City, New Yor
CauseStroke
Aged73 years
Willa Sibert Cather was born upon December 7, 1873, in Back Creek Valley, Virginia, in the United States. The little girl of Charles Fectigue Cather, a sheep farmer, and Mary Virginia Boak Cather, Willa was the oldest of 7 children. The family transferred to Nebraska when she was nine years of ages, where her papa transitioned from a farmer to a sectarian banker. The landscape and introducing spirit of the American West would take place to inspire much of Cather's writing.

During her youth, Cather was revealed to the diverse population of country Nebraska, consisting of immigrants from Sweden, Norway, France, and also Bohemia. Cather's education and learning started at residence with her mother and grandma, and also she eventually went to Red Cloud High School, where she mastered her research studies. Following her graduation, she researched at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln from 1891 to 1895. Initially pursuing scientific research, Cather changed to literature after her English professor submitted among her essays to a local paper. This event noted the start of Cather's literary profession.

After university, Cather worked as the managing editor of the "Home Monthly" magazine in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Throughout this time around, she composed poems, short stories, and content concentrating on life in Nebraska. By 1900, she was showing secondary school English in Pittsburgh while still adding to newspapers and also publications. Cather's links to significant writers, such as Sarah Orne Jewett, affected her growth as an author.

In 1904, she signed up with the staff of McClure's Magazine in New York City, looking for more chances to develop her voice in the literary world. Progressively, she transitioned from journalism to focus on her fiction creating. By 1912, Cather's initial novel, "Alexander's Bridge", was released, but it was her second novel, "O Pioneers!" (1913) that brought Cather extensive recognition.

Throughout her occupation, Cather released a lots stories and numerous short stories, most of which received vital praise. "My Ántonia" (1918), "A Lost Lady" (1923), and also "Death Comes for the Archbishop" (1927) are simply a few examples of her literary payments during this duration. In 1922, Cather was granted the Pulitzer Prize for her unique "One of Ours" (1922), which was set during World War I and also featured a protagonist from her indigenous Nebraska.

Willa Cather was an exclusive person, typically called withdrawn and reserved. Her connections with ladies such as Isabelle McClung, Edith Lewis, and also the sis of the Hambourg Conservatory, both personal and specialist, greatly affected her work. She maintained long-term friendships with these and other individuals throughout her life.

Cather remained to create until her fatality on April 24, 1947, in New York City. She left behind a heritage that extensively captured the spirit of the American West and the complexities of life on the frontier. Her books have remained to be commemorated for their expedition of the human experience as well as continue to be essential items of American literary background.

Our collection contains 32 quotes who is written / told by Willa.

Related authors: James Lane Allen (Author), Sarah Orne Jewett (Author), Red Cloud (Statesman)

Willa Cather Famous Works:
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32 Famous quotes by Willa Cather

Small: Some memories are realities, and are better than anything that can ever happen to one again
"Some memories are realities, and are better than anything that can ever happen to one again"
Small: There are some things you learn best in calm, and some in storm
"There are some things you learn best in calm, and some in storm"
Small: A work-room should be like an old shoe no matter how shabby, its better than a new one
"A work-room should be like an old shoe; no matter how shabby, it's better than a new one"
Small: What was any art but a mould in which to imprison for a moment the shining elusive element which is lif
"What was any art but a mould in which to imprison for a moment the shining elusive element which is life itself - life hurrying past us and running away, too strong to stop, too sweet to lose"
Small: All the intelligence and talent in the world cant make a singer. The voice is a wild thing. It cant be
"All the intelligence and talent in the world can't make a singer. The voice is a wild thing. It can't be bred in captivity. It is a sport, like the silver fox. It happens"
Small: Sometimes a neighbor whom we have disliked a lifetime for his arrogance and conceit lets fall a single
"Sometimes a neighbor whom we have disliked a lifetime for his arrogance and conceit lets fall a single commonplace remark that shows us another side, another man, really; a man uncertain, and puzzled, and in the dark like ourselves"
Small: Of all the bewildering things about a new country, the absence of human landmarks is one of the most de
"Of all the bewildering things about a new country, the absence of human landmarks is one of the most depressing and disheartening"
Small: I shall not die of a cold. I shall die of having lived
"I shall not die of a cold. I shall die of having lived"
Small: The thing that teases the mind over and over for years, and at last gets itself put down rightly on pap
"The thing that teases the mind over and over for years, and at last gets itself put down rightly on paper whether little or great, it belongs to Literature"
Small: There are only two or three human stories, and they go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they h
"There are only two or three human stories, and they go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before"
Small: The heart of another is a dark forest, always, no matter how close it has been to ones own
"The heart of another is a dark forest, always, no matter how close it has been to one's own"
Small: It does not matter much whom we live with in this world, but it matters a great deal whom we dream of
"It does not matter much whom we live with in this world, but it matters a great deal whom we dream of"
Small: Give the people a new word and they think they have a new fact
"Give the people a new word and they think they have a new fact"
Small: Where there is great love, there are always wishes
"Where there is great love, there are always wishes"
Small: I like trees because they seem more resigned to the way they have to live than other things do
"I like trees because they seem more resigned to the way they have to live than other things do"
Small: Desire is creation, is the magical element in that process. If there were an instrument by which to mea
"Desire is creation, is the magical element in that process. If there were an instrument by which to measure desire, one could foretell achievement"
Small: To note an artists limitations is but to define his talent. A reporter can write equally well about eve
"To note an artist's limitations is but to define his talent. A reporter can write equally well about everything that is presented to his view, but a creative writer can do his best only with what lies within the range and character of his deepest sympathies"
Small: The miracles of the church seem to me to rest not so much upon faces or voices or healing power coming
"The miracles of the church seem to me to rest not so much upon faces or voices or healing power coming suddenly near to us from afar off, but upon our perceptions being made finer, so that for a moment our eyes can see and our ears can hear what is there about us always"
Small: The irregular and intimate quality of things made entirely by the human hand
"The irregular and intimate quality of things made entirely by the human hand"
Small: The dead might as well try to speak to the living as the old to the young
"The dead might as well try to speak to the living as the old to the young"
Small: The condition every art requires is, not so much freedom from restriction, as freedom from adulteration
"The condition every art requires is, not so much freedom from restriction, as freedom from adulteration and from the intrusion of foreign matter"
Small: The sun was like a great visiting presence that stimulated and took its due from all animal energy.
"The sun was like a great visiting presence that stimulated and took its due from all animal energy. When it flung wide its cloak and stepped down over the edge of the fields at evening, it left behind it a spent and exhausted world"
Small: Every artist makes himself born. It is very much harder than the other time, and longer
"Every artist makes himself born. It is very much harder than the other time, and longer"
Small: When kindness has left people, even for a few moments, we become afraid of them as if their reason had
"When kindness has left people, even for a few moments, we become afraid of them as if their reason had left them. When it has left a place where we have always found it, it is like shipwreck; we drop from security into something malevolent and bottomless"
Small: The stupid believe that to be truthful is easy only the artist, the great artist, knows how difficult i
"The stupid believe that to be truthful is easy; only the artist, the great artist, knows how difficult it is"
Small: The fact that I was a girl never damaged my ambitions to be a pope or an emperor
"The fact that I was a girl never damaged my ambitions to be a pope or an emperor"
Small: Sometimes I wonder why God ever trusts talent in the hands of women, they usually make such an infernal
"Sometimes I wonder why God ever trusts talent in the hands of women, they usually make such an infernal mess of it. I think He must do it as a sort of ghastly joke"
Small: Only solitary men know the full joys of frienship. Others have their family but to a solitary and an ex
"Only solitary men know the full joys of frienship. Others have their family; but to a solitary and an exile, his friends are everything"
Small: No one can build his security upon the nobleness of another person
"No one can build his security upon the nobleness of another person"
Small: Most of the basic material a writer works with is acquired before the age of fifteen
"Most of the basic material a writer works with is acquired before the age of fifteen"
Small: That is happiness to be dissolved into something complete and great
"That is happiness; to be dissolved into something complete and great"
Small: Paris is a hard place to leave, even when it rains incessantly and one coughs continually from the damp
"Paris is a hard place to leave, even when it rains incessantly and one coughs continually from the dampness"