earticle

영어

This paper examines the emergence of early female pioneers in the West who were erased by the Western mythology through Willa Cather’s O Pioneers! Alexandra Bergson has immigrated from Bohemia to America with her family. Her father, John Bergson, had difficulties in adjusting to the wild land of the West. Therefore, he relies on Alexandra who studies about crops and makes every effort to cultivate wasteland. For these reasons, he chooses Alexandra as his successor instead of his three sons in the face of death. In Cather’s point of view, the most important thing in the frontier is the sufficient labor force to reclaim the barren soil and the constant studying of the land. Therefore, it is not the succession of patriarchal incompetence but the birth of a powerful matriarch to pioneer the West and lead her family’s life in the West. Unlike male writers, Cather discusses the existence and history of women, which have been ignored in Western history, through the success stories of female pioneers who have made American dreams in the western frontier.