English Education Methods 332

Grant T. Smith, Ph. D.

Teaching the Novel: My Antonia

I firmly believe that it is true that the person doing most of the work is the person doing most of the learning. Hence…

We will be reading and discussing My Antonia in the English 221 class in a few weeks. Your assignment is to prepare a unit plan on this book as if you were going to teach it to a college preparation class. (This book is often taught at the junior or senior level and so you may have an occasion to use your material.) In this unit plan you may want to consider any of the following:

· Biographical information on Willa Cather

· Literary criticisms on My Antonia

· Lectures on regional or local color writing

· Other works by Cather (short stories)

· Discussion questions

· Writing assignments (essay questions or creative writing assignments)

· Vocabulary exercises

· Group activities (role playing, group discussions)

· Individual projects

· The internet

· Exam (or quizzes)

· Film

Let's assume that you will take two weeks on My Antonia (five school days). Prepare daily lesson plans and include in those lesson plans what you plan to do each day, your objectives, assessment measures, and a time table for the activities planned.

Check out the textbooks on reserve in the library for Education 332. There are several chapters that deal with teaching the novel. They may be helpful to you.

Will I ask you to "teach" My Antonia to the English 221 students? I'll leave that up to you.

English 321

Grant T. Smith, Ph. D.

My Antonia – Discussion Questions

• How would you respond to critics who claim that My Antonia has several structural flaws including: (a) many episodes seem to have little apparent function in the novel; (b) while the book is supposed to be about Antonia, most of it is actually about Jim; (c) although Jim claims that he would have liked to have married Antonia, there is little in the book to support this; (d) there is an emotional emptiness in Jim and Antonia’s relationship; (e) Jim is an unreliable narrator who exposes and criticizes the tradition he supposedly represents; and (f) the novel is a pastoral romance.

• How is Willa Cather a “Western” writer?

• Discuss how My Antonia is a book about “class distinctions,” an underlying conflict between the old, established American stock, and the new immigrants from Eastern Europe. How does Cather treat the only Black in the book?

• Do a bit of research of Willa Cather’s life and her sources for My Antonia. Can you explain why some critics claim that Jim Burden is Cather’s alter ego?

• The narrative in My Antonia begins with Antonia and Jim’s journey to Nebraska. Discuss how the book now may be read as a tale of separation and loss to union and possession for both of the main characters.

• How do you feel about Antonia and Jim when the novel ends? Did you like these characters? Which character seems “complete” to you? Use textual evidence to support your conclusions.

• Why doesn’t Jim marry Antonia?

• Explain how the following add levels of meaning to My Antonia:

1. Wick Cutter
2. Pavel and Peter’s story
3. Jim’s killing of the snake
4. Mr. Shimerda’s suicide
5. The black pianist

• Annette Kolodny in The Lay of the Land discusses how men have gendered the land as feminine for many years, and that this need to experience the land as a nurturing maternal figure comes from the men’s perception of the frontier as a threatening, alien, and potentially emasculating terrifying unknown. Implicit in the metaphor of the land-as-woman is both the regressive pull of maternal containment and the seductive invitation to sexual assertion. Does Kolodyn’s thesis hold true in My Antonia? You may also want to refer to Nina Baym’s “Melodramas of Beset Manhood” as you respond.

• Is your reading of My Antonia complicated in any way by knowing that Willa Cather (a lesbian) writes the story in a male persona’s voice?