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Summary: Death Comes for the Archbishop
Review: Willa Cather's Death Comes for the Archbishop is a deceptively simple but profound novel about two French missionaries in the Southwestern United States. These men are not terribly otherworldly and they are capable of enjoying good books, good wine, and good food. They are tough guys too, up to the task of traveling thousands of miles on horseback or facing down some bad guys. The religion they promote provides support and comfort to Mexicans, Indians, and some Anglo miners who need spiritual succor.The book presents us with several vignettes in the lives of these urbane priests, as well as some fables and Southwestern folklore. By living in harmony with God's law and the world he created, the men prosper. Eventually, they must part, and they must grow old and die. But death holds no horror for men like these who have spent their lives in service to others. Cather's writing is beautiful and direct. In the following passage, one of the priests and his friend spend several days traveling together: As Father Latour and Eusabio approached Albuquerque, they occasionally fell in with company; Indians going to and fro on the long winding trails across the plain, or up into the Sandia mountains. They had all of them the same quiet way of moving, whether their pace was swift or slow, and the same unobtrusive demeanor: an Indian wrapped in his bright blanket, seated upon his mule or walking beside it, moving through the pale new-budding sage-brush, winding among the sand waves, as if it were his business to pass unseen and unheard through a country awakening with spring. North of Laguna two Zuni runners sped by them, going somewhere east on "Indian business." They saluted Eusabio by gestures with the open palm, but did not stop. They coursed over the sand with the fleetness of young antelope, their bodies disappearing and reappearing among the sand dunes, like the shadows that eagles cast in their strong, unhurried flight. Her book also contains some beautiful ideas. In this passage, the two priests discuss Our Lady of Guadalupe: "Where there is great love there are always miracles," [Father Latour] said at length. "One might almost say that an apparition is human vision corrected by divine love. I do not see you as you really are, Joseph; I see you through my affection for you. The Miracles of the Church seem to me to rest not so much upon faces or voices or healing power coming suddenly near to us from afar off, but upon our perceptions being made finer, so that for a moment our eyes can see and our ears can hear what is there about us always." This book has it all: fine writing, adventure, and some lessons for living. Most highly recommended.
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Summary: Don't worry. It gets better.
Review: After reading this book, I would not name my Great Dane Willa Cather, but I did very much enjoy her portrait of the Bishop Lamy of Santa Fe. I am sympathetic with those who say that the Bishop is a harbinger of capitalism and out-of-touch with the Indians and Mexicans, and at first I was bothered by Cather's acceptance and relative lack of bias towards all groups. Although she seemed to occasionally stereotype, for the most part she didn't seem to take sides at all. I wanted her to be more critical and judgmental! It is a rather slowly told tale, but not difficult for any level of reader. And finally near the end she begins to achieve beauty. My favorite landscape line: "Elsewhere the sky is the roof of the world; but here the earth was the floor of the sky". My favorite explanation of alone time: "It was not a solitude of atrophy, of negation, but of perpetual flowering." And finally she hints at environmental destruction and the difference in how different people treat the planet, discusses the plight of the Navajo, and calls Kit Carson, who until nearly the last page has been a gentleman and a scholar, "misguided". I was relieved. Go get 'em Willa. It may be slow going at first, but it's rewards are many especially if you are interested in history. In Stuart Udall's The Founding Fathers, you will also find some discussion of Bishop Lamy.
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