In honor of the 125th anniversary of the NYT Book Review, the 1913 review of Cather's "O Pioneers!"

Here's an excerpt from what was published in the paper today: 

The hero of the American novel very often starts on the farm, but he seldom stays there; instead, he uses it as a springboard from which to plunge into the mysteries of politics or finance. Probably the novel reflects a national tendency. To be sure, after we have carefully separated ourselves from the soil, we are apt to talk a lot about the advantages of a return to it, but in most cases it ends there. The average American does not have any deep instinct for the land, or vital consciousness of the dignity and value of the life that may be lived upon it.

“O Pioneers!” is filled with this instinct and this consciousness. It is a tale of the old wood-and-field worshiping races, Swedes and Bohemians, transplanted to Nebraskan uplands, of their struggle with the untamed soil, and their final conquest of it.

Be sure to read the rest here, which includes some fascinating reflections on gender and the feminine.  Here's a post about "O Pioneers!" that I wrote in 2012, when I first read the book.