Obscure Destinies V179

By Willa Cather

Book Overview

The jacket of the first edition of Obscure Destinies announced "Three New Stories of the West," heralding Willa Cather's return to what many thought of as "her" territory--the Great Plains. These... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0394711793
• ISBN13: 9780394711799
• Release Date: August 1974
• Publisher: Vintage
• Length: 229 Pages
• Weight: 0.58 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 4.3" x 7.2"

Customer Reviews

Short Stories of Willa Cather

'The Neighbor Rosicky' is a beautiful story of a real person of family life. The descriptive detail is beautiful yet simple. 'Old Mrs. Smith' is a story of what it is to be an old lady - - her grace, her role and pride as seen from many angles. 'Two Friends' deals with a strange friendship, strong in its being and strong in its destruction.

Neighbour Rosicky

This collection of three stories--each over fifty pages--contains what I believe is the most emotionally beautiful "short story" ever written: "Neighbour Rosicky". Here is a story of love, and despair; beauty and tragedy. All life entails suffering, but it is up to us how we handle suffering: we either handle it with dignity or despair; this volume bespeaks of the former. When the crop fails, Rosicky takes his family on a picknick, so they can appreciate what they have, not what they don't. Rosicky--with a bad heart--rakes the Russian thistle from his son's neighboring farm because "he was afraid their seed would root and 'take the alfalfa'". Some call this "silly sentimentalism", but it is not: it is the beauty of appreciating life in the simple things. Willa Cather, like Shakespeare, is a word-smith for all ages, and will be read--in a thousand years--alongside Homer and his ilk.