Willa Cather Scholar celebrates New Oxford World Edition of The Professor's House
Join us at Francie & Finch Bookshop as we celebrate the newest edition of Willa Cather's The Professor's House, with Melissa Homestead! Homestead, a Professor of English and Program Faculty in Women's and Gender Studies at UNL, brings to life this new edition with a brand new introduction and notes for those looking to dive deeper into the work of Cather. Melissa will be in conversation with Emily Rau, Editor of the Willa Cather Archive. We can't wait to see you there!
Copies available for purchase at the event.
ABOUT THE BOOK:
'I knew at once I had come upon the city of some extinct civilization, hidden away in this inaccessible mesa for centuries.'
The Professor's House (1925) depicts the mid-life crisis of Godfrey St. Peter, a history professor at a midwestern state university who is disillusioned with his wife and daughters, his university, and the materialism of American culture. He longs for Tom Outland, his most brilliant student, who died on a World War I battlefield. At the same time, Tom's recollection of discovering hidden cliff dweller ruins in New Mexico interrupts Godfrey's narrative. Cather's own experiences of travel in the Southwestern US with her partner, Edith Lewis, shadow and enrich her depictions of Tom's New Mexican experiences.
Cather's sixth novel is a compelling modernist work of art that raises questions that are still compelling a century later. What is the purpose of a university education? Are the sacrifices of war worth the outcome? To whom do the American past and the country's future belong? A daring experiment in form, the novel is haunted by war and love.
ABOUT THE SERIES:
For over 100 years, Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.
ABOUT MELISSA J. HOMESTEAD
Melissa J. Homestead is Professor of English and Program Faculty in Women's and Gender Studies at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, where she directs the Cather Project and is co-editor of The Complete Letters of Willa Cather. She has published widely on American women's writing and authorship, including American Women Authors and Literary Property (2005) and The Only Wonderful Things: The Creative Partnership of Willa Cather and Edith Lewis (2021).
ABOUT EMILY RAU:
Emily J. Rau is an Assistant Professor in Digital Humanities in the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries and the Editor of the Willa Cather Archive. She received her MA from Lehigh University and her PhD from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln
