What you don't know, Willa Cather?

The amazing 20th century writer known for subtly nuanced characters and an intimate understanding of place?

All right, then, let's get you caught up.

In the next hour, join me Meg Wallitzer

and one of Cathar's biggest fans, documentarian Ken Burns, as we explore Willa Cather's America.

You're listening to Selected Shorts, where our greatest actors transport us through the magic of fiction, one short story at a time.

When you picture early American life, maybe you imagine the salty sea dogs and rough-and-tumble port towns of Herman Melville,

or the unforgiving wilds and rugged adventurers

of James Fenimore Cooper, or the schoolhouses and steamships populated by Mark Twain's

playful rogues. Sure, all that stuff is in my head, too. But I've got other things up there

as well, the vast western prairies of Nebraska

and the determined, passionate artists of New York.

Yes, I'm talking about Willa Cather, the underappreciated 20th century writer behind titles,

including My Antonia and O Pioneers.

While she may not hold the sway of various white guys in early American literature,

or even someone like Louisa May Alcott, Cather was a powerful writer with a clear-eyed sense

of the world around her. But all the writers I know love Willa Cather. My friend Mary Gordon

says she loves her because Cather is not afraid of impossible situations to which there are no solutions.

And Mary adds, she's a tragedian, but unlike many American writers, there's no melodrama in it.

When I first read Cather, the rhythms of the Great Plains were a far, wind-swept cry from my own suburban existence. But it wasn't only

the landscape that I loved. The inner landscape is also Cather's strength. So why am I telling

you this now? Well, for one, literature lovers recently celebrated Cather's sesquicentennial,

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