First Thoughts on Cather

I am about halfway through My Antonia already, and my biggest thought is that it is such a vivid portrait of a particular moment in the golden age of farming in the American Midwest.  With Cather's descriptions, you can see the wheat blowing in the wind and feel the cold winds of winter on your face.  I also find it interesting that at that time, the farmers considered themselves better off (not better than, just better off) than those who worked in town for a weekly wage, and I don't believe that has been the feeling of farmers for quite a while now.  It is a shame to have lost that agrarian feeling upon which much of this country was built.