The girls I knew were always helping to pay for ploughs and reapers, brood-sows, or steers to fatten. One result of this family solidarity was that the foreign farmers in our county were the first to become prosperous. After the fathers were out of debt, the daughters married the sons of neighbors,—usually of like nationality,—and the girls who once worked in Black Hawk kitchens are to-day managing big farms and fine families of their own; their children are better off than the children of the town women they used to serve.
I loved the conviviality and youthful innocence of the scenes in the tent. Your question provokes deeper thought about the social dynamic, and my sense is -- it depends on who you ask. The girls may have felt liberated but not fully aware of how they were seen. Or they refused to acknowledge it - which is a more intriguing idea. (As for dancing in conservative communities, I went to college with a woman who was raised in the Mennonite community in Virginia. She said her clever parents cautioned her against premarital sex because it might lead to dancing. 😂 )
On the subject of class - these chapters reminded me of my Midwestern grandmother, who had Bohemian blood on her mother's side. She was such a judgmental snob about class; for her the measures were higher education and money. She was hyper-aware of everyone's status and herself a social climber. The architecture school where I teach has many first-generation students. Often they or their parents are from Central or South America. They work hard, both at school and in jobs, and they do excellent work. They stand out for their passion to succeed and willingness to try new things.
I was so angry with the way the Harlings handled Harry Paine's assault of Antonia, for all the predictable reasons. Blaming women for men's predation is still rampant today, sadly. This chapter serves as a reminder of that, but in a literary sense I admire how Antonia's actions following their egregious gaslighting further distinguish her character. (Knowing what's coming, both at the Cutter's and later, I admire her independence and strength all the more. Her light will never diminish.)
I listened to these chapters on a long run along the banks of the Charles River in Boston, so I keep seeing in my mind where I was on that run as I reread these passages.
That Mennonite story cracks me up. I once taught a formerly Mennonite family how to waltz in their farmhouse kitchen. It felt transgressive dancing with their oldest daughter (I wrote an essay about it), and it's gone on feeling so even in hindsight! I mean, some things like slow dancing and singing harmony are incredibly intimate experiences.
The Harlings aren't the only ones to blame Ántonia for the actions of others. Jim does this, too, unfortunately. Like you, I admire her defiance and her recognition that she needs to snatch at happiness when she can. Interesting that you see the Harlings gaslighting Ántonia. Can you say more? Some might see them as trying to look out for her, even if it comes across as condescending and controlling. But they are more concerned, it seems, with their own social standing. And the way they wash their hands of her is appalling.
Of course your story brings to mind the incredible scene where they're dancing in the barn in "Witness."
On the gaslighting, I went back and took another look. It's Mr. Harling (figures?): "You've been going with girls who have a reputation for being free and easy, and now you've got the same reputation. I won't have this and that fellow tramping about my back yard all the time. This is the end of it, tonight. It stops, short. You can quit going to these dances, or you can hunt another place." I may have used gaslighting incorrectly there. Psychology today says this: "Victims of gaslighting are deliberately and systematically fed false information that leads them to question what they know to be true, often about themselves." That's not exactly what happened, but Mr. Harling did blame her for the boy's outrageous assault of her.
Definitely picked up on the family being 90% concerned about their own standing vs 10% for her.
Heavy handed and unsympathetic. They think they've been doing her a favor all this time by allowing her to work in their house (and Mrs. Harling had a savior complex from the beginning, resolving to make something of her), despite the great joy she brought to the family. And you're right -- the notion that being perceived as "free and easy" excuses any behavior by a young man about to be married is really something. Ántonia seems to understand her own boundaries clearly and to enforce them, as the slap illustrates. Now I'm wondering about whether there might be Old World / New World dynamics here. Maybe it's the American men who are free and easy, not the girls with European sensibilities, who don't necessarily confuse fun with debauchery? <-- This is based largely on speculation and anecdotes from my travels abroad, not on any historical evidence. But I think there is a puritanical strain of American thinking that establishes rigid moral boundaries and then punishes women disproportionately for violating them.
You are right on the money. The only Americans allowed to be free and easy are guys, who are then quick to condemn women for being “loose.” Rigid moral boundaries for thee but not for me. Europeans are more sophisticated in their thinking.
I was particularly struck by the blind piano player. Such an interesting character to introduce. And makes me think much of what Cather is writing about is caste. Cather the narrator identifies him as mulatto but shows the characters treating him in a subservient position to which he plays their foil. Perhaps because I'm reading Everett Percival's new novel JAMES, I latched onto this character as serving an interesting purpose in the story. The way music disinhibits humans and dance moves people into new relationships to themselves and others -- the dance floor as melting pot. While trying desperately to fit in, there is real resistance to the assimilation of new American customs. This entire section on life in Black Hawk paints a portrait of the double-bind of gender within a caste system.
Great points, Jill. Caste is a very interesting way of thinking about My Ántonia. Though it is ironic, isn't it, that the immigrant families seem to so rapidly subvert caste? Even so, I think Cather's Southern upbringing stayed with her even into adulthood. There was a chapter in Pittsburgh, when she lived with the wealthy McClung family, that also greatly influenced her views. Success for her artistic heroines often means breaking through a caste barrier.
I'm not sure if you've read Isabel Wilkerson, but I really like her use of caste to make sense of American history. Her framing does seem more nuanced than the typical race-based analysis.
Yes, I'm familiar and admire Wilkerson's brilliant book. Enjoyed the film Origin based on her writing of Caste, too. My own research and writing about the place where my great-grandparents homesteaded on diminished Red Lake Reservation is informed by her work. Last week's post on substack, it came into play in my discovery of Mr. Begg, the translator during the sale of allotted Indian land to the local school board who I learned was Scottish-Metis. Reading My Antonia helps me think about what appropriation and assimiliation and resistance looked like then and how foreigners assimiliated into whitestream American culture.
Thanks for the nudge to check out your series! "Whitestream" is a good way to put it. It's incredible how much cultural diversity was wiped out in just a generation or two. Patricia Hampl speaks about this in "A Romantic Education" -- she learned next to nothing about her Czech heritage from her Czech grandmother. Sometimes immigration was a way to leave behind unhappy stories that people had no wish to recall. But for many of us, even an unhappy history is better than silence.
Thanks for subscribing! Whitestream is a term coined first by Sandy Grande in Red Pedagogy I think (first edition in the 90s; updated in 2015). Thanks for the reference to Patricia Hampl. I will return to her work. I think you are right that many immigrants left behind unhappy stories or pasts they did not want following them. I grew up knowing nothing about their immigration story. The story began on the shores of this country. My sister has done the genealogical work to reveal possible motives, but their stories seem to have vanished. This homogenization into whitestream culture after the Civil War seems a different way to think about which stories got passed down through the generations and what family secrets went to their graves.
Why did she include the tramp's story? The parallels to her own father's suicide -- that he could not provide for himself or family seems reason enough. He seems mad to have orchestrated his own death by volunteering to work the thrasher in such a manner and yet it makes perfect sense. How else could he have done it? There seems to be implied a certain honor in having done it. More honor in death than in life. And her father's death seems more honorable than this mad man who made a mess for everyone else whereas her father had shown more respect in his last act of desperation. The trampers and the bums and the hobos or the Bohemians and the Russians and the Czechs are all ways to distinguish caste during hard times.
I loved the conviviality and youthful innocence of the scenes in the tent. Your question provokes deeper thought about the social dynamic, and my sense is -- it depends on who you ask. The girls may have felt liberated but not fully aware of how they were seen. Or they refused to acknowledge it - which is a more intriguing idea. (As for dancing in conservative communities, I went to college with a woman who was raised in the Mennonite community in Virginia. She said her clever parents cautioned her against premarital sex because it might lead to dancing. 😂 )
On the subject of class - these chapters reminded me of my Midwestern grandmother, who had Bohemian blood on her mother's side. She was such a judgmental snob about class; for her the measures were higher education and money. She was hyper-aware of everyone's status and herself a social climber. The architecture school where I teach has many first-generation students. Often they or their parents are from Central or South America. They work hard, both at school and in jobs, and they do excellent work. They stand out for their passion to succeed and willingness to try new things.
I was so angry with the way the Harlings handled Harry Paine's assault of Antonia, for all the predictable reasons. Blaming women for men's predation is still rampant today, sadly. This chapter serves as a reminder of that, but in a literary sense I admire how Antonia's actions following their egregious gaslighting further distinguish her character. (Knowing what's coming, both at the Cutter's and later, I admire her independence and strength all the more. Her light will never diminish.)
I listened to these chapters on a long run along the banks of the Charles River in Boston, so I keep seeing in my mind where I was on that run as I reread these passages.
That Mennonite story cracks me up. I once taught a formerly Mennonite family how to waltz in their farmhouse kitchen. It felt transgressive dancing with their oldest daughter (I wrote an essay about it), and it's gone on feeling so even in hindsight! I mean, some things like slow dancing and singing harmony are incredibly intimate experiences.
The Harlings aren't the only ones to blame Ántonia for the actions of others. Jim does this, too, unfortunately. Like you, I admire her defiance and her recognition that she needs to snatch at happiness when she can. Interesting that you see the Harlings gaslighting Ántonia. Can you say more? Some might see them as trying to look out for her, even if it comes across as condescending and controlling. But they are more concerned, it seems, with their own social standing. And the way they wash their hands of her is appalling.
Of course your story brings to mind the incredible scene where they're dancing in the barn in "Witness."
On the gaslighting, I went back and took another look. It's Mr. Harling (figures?): "You've been going with girls who have a reputation for being free and easy, and now you've got the same reputation. I won't have this and that fellow tramping about my back yard all the time. This is the end of it, tonight. It stops, short. You can quit going to these dances, or you can hunt another place." I may have used gaslighting incorrectly there. Psychology today says this: "Victims of gaslighting are deliberately and systematically fed false information that leads them to question what they know to be true, often about themselves." That's not exactly what happened, but Mr. Harling did blame her for the boy's outrageous assault of her.
Definitely picked up on the family being 90% concerned about their own standing vs 10% for her.
Heavy handed and unsympathetic. They think they've been doing her a favor all this time by allowing her to work in their house (and Mrs. Harling had a savior complex from the beginning, resolving to make something of her), despite the great joy she brought to the family. And you're right -- the notion that being perceived as "free and easy" excuses any behavior by a young man about to be married is really something. Ántonia seems to understand her own boundaries clearly and to enforce them, as the slap illustrates. Now I'm wondering about whether there might be Old World / New World dynamics here. Maybe it's the American men who are free and easy, not the girls with European sensibilities, who don't necessarily confuse fun with debauchery? <-- This is based largely on speculation and anecdotes from my travels abroad, not on any historical evidence. But I think there is a puritanical strain of American thinking that establishes rigid moral boundaries and then punishes women disproportionately for violating them.
You are right on the money. The only Americans allowed to be free and easy are guys, who are then quick to condemn women for being “loose.” Rigid moral boundaries for thee but not for me. Europeans are more sophisticated in their thinking.
I was particularly struck by the blind piano player. Such an interesting character to introduce. And makes me think much of what Cather is writing about is caste. Cather the narrator identifies him as mulatto but shows the characters treating him in a subservient position to which he plays their foil. Perhaps because I'm reading Everett Percival's new novel JAMES, I latched onto this character as serving an interesting purpose in the story. The way music disinhibits humans and dance moves people into new relationships to themselves and others -- the dance floor as melting pot. While trying desperately to fit in, there is real resistance to the assimilation of new American customs. This entire section on life in Black Hawk paints a portrait of the double-bind of gender within a caste system.
Great points, Jill. Caste is a very interesting way of thinking about My Ántonia. Though it is ironic, isn't it, that the immigrant families seem to so rapidly subvert caste? Even so, I think Cather's Southern upbringing stayed with her even into adulthood. There was a chapter in Pittsburgh, when she lived with the wealthy McClung family, that also greatly influenced her views. Success for her artistic heroines often means breaking through a caste barrier.
I'm not sure if you've read Isabel Wilkerson, but I really like her use of caste to make sense of American history. Her framing does seem more nuanced than the typical race-based analysis.
https://www.npr.org/2020/08/04/898574852/its-more-than-racism-isabel-wilkerson-explains-america-s-caste-system
Yes, I'm familiar and admire Wilkerson's brilliant book. Enjoyed the film Origin based on her writing of Caste, too. My own research and writing about the place where my great-grandparents homesteaded on diminished Red Lake Reservation is informed by her work. Last week's post on substack, it came into play in my discovery of Mr. Begg, the translator during the sale of allotted Indian land to the local school board who I learned was Scottish-Metis. Reading My Antonia helps me think about what appropriation and assimiliation and resistance looked like then and how foreigners assimiliated into whitestream American culture.
Thanks for the nudge to check out your series! "Whitestream" is a good way to put it. It's incredible how much cultural diversity was wiped out in just a generation or two. Patricia Hampl speaks about this in "A Romantic Education" -- she learned next to nothing about her Czech heritage from her Czech grandmother. Sometimes immigration was a way to leave behind unhappy stories that people had no wish to recall. But for many of us, even an unhappy history is better than silence.
Thanks for subscribing! Whitestream is a term coined first by Sandy Grande in Red Pedagogy I think (first edition in the 90s; updated in 2015). Thanks for the reference to Patricia Hampl. I will return to her work. I think you are right that many immigrants left behind unhappy stories or pasts they did not want following them. I grew up knowing nothing about their immigration story. The story began on the shores of this country. My sister has done the genealogical work to reveal possible motives, but their stories seem to have vanished. This homogenization into whitestream culture after the Civil War seems a different way to think about which stories got passed down through the generations and what family secrets went to their graves.
Why did she include the tramp's story? The parallels to her own father's suicide -- that he could not provide for himself or family seems reason enough. He seems mad to have orchestrated his own death by volunteering to work the thrasher in such a manner and yet it makes perfect sense. How else could he have done it? There seems to be implied a certain honor in having done it. More honor in death than in life. And her father's death seems more honorable than this mad man who made a mess for everyone else whereas her father had shown more respect in his last act of desperation. The trampers and the bums and the hobos or the Bohemians and the Russians and the Czechs are all ways to distinguish caste during hard times.