Willa Sibert Cather (/ˈkæðər/; born Wilella Sibert Cather; December 7, 1873 – April 24, 1947) was an American writer known for her novels of life on the Great Plains, including O Pioneers!, The Song of the Lark, and My Ántonia. In 1923, she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for One of Ours, a novel set during World War I.
Willa Cather and her family moved from Virginia to Webster County, Nebraska, when she was nine years old. The family later settled in the town of Red Cloud. Shortly after graduating from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, Cather moved to Pittsburgh for ten years, supporting herself as a magazine editor and high school English teacher. At the age of 33, she moved to New York City, her primary home for the rest of her life, though she also traveled widely and spent considerable time at her summer residence on Grand Manan Island, New Brunswick. She spent the last 39 years of her life with her domestic partner, Edith Lewis, before being diagnosed with breast cancer and dying of a cerebral hemorrhage. Lewis is buried beside her in a Jaffrey, New Hampshire plot.
Books in order of publication:
Novels
Alexander’s Bridge (1912)
Pioneers! (1913)
The Song of the Lark (1915)
My Ántonia (1918)
One of Ours (1922)
A Lost Lady (1923)
The Professor’s House (1925)
My Mortal Enemy (1926)
Death Comes for the Archbishop (1927)
Shadows on the Rock (1931)
Lucy Gayheart (1935)
Sapphira and the Slave Girl (1940)
Short fiction
The Troll Garden (1905)
Youth and the Bright Medusa (1920)
Obscure Destinies (1932)
Neighbour Rosicky (1932)
The Old Beauty and Others (1948)
Five Stories (1956)
Willa Cather’s Collected Short Fiction, 1892–1912 (1965)
Uncle Valentine and Other Stories: Willa Cather’s Uncollected Short Fiction, 1915–1929 (1972)
Poetry
April Twilights (1903)
April Twilights and Other Poems (1923)
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