Death Comes for the Archbishop

Willa Cather was quite an unusual woman for her time.  She was born in Virginia in 1873, but her family moved to Nebraska when she was nine. Instead of marrying a farmer, she went to the University of Nebraska to be a doctor.  It was there that she discovered her writing talent and graduated with a BA in English in 1894.  Still NOT married to a farmer, she moved to Pittsburgh to write for a ladies magazine.  Ten years later she moved to New York City where she started writing for McClure's Magazine.  Her first novel was published in 1912. She never did marry a farmer. She was what you might call an "emancipated woman".

Despite her cosmopolitan lifestyle, she was deeply affected by her time on the Great Plains of Nebraska, and wrote with obvious love for the people of that harsh land.  I read O Pioneers years ago, but you may have read My Antonia or The Song of the Lark, all three books set on the prairie.  I am NOT writing about any of those today.


Death Comes for the Archbishop begins in 1851 right after the US won control of New Mexico, and the Catholic Church has sent Father Jean Marie Latour into the territory to take charge of the missions.  The problem was, no one asked the Mexicans and Native Americans if they wanted someone to take charge. It is a difficult assignment in a vast and dangerous land, but Father Latour is a Jesuit, and if a Jesuit can't do it, nobody can! (Just ask my Jesuit-educated husband.) This is the story of Father Jean's 40 year journey, but his co-star is the land itself, and just as she wrote about Nebraska, Cather weaves a tale that cannot exist without its landscape.  I really knew very little about New Mexico before reading this book...now I want to know more.  And go to Santa Fe.  Read Death Comes to the Archbishop, and don't worry, there's really only a little bit of death in it.

PS:  Thanks for the recommendation, Karen!