Themes in My Antonia

We sit looking run into across the country, watching the sun go down. The curly grass ab come to the fore us was on fire now. The shinny of the oaks turned bolshie as copper. There was a shimmer of bullion on the brown river. Out in the stream the sandbars glittered bid glass, and the legerity trembled in the willow thickets as if piffling flames were leaping among them. The breeze sank to stillness. In the ravine a ringdove mourned plaintively, and somewhere off in the bushes an owl hooted. The girls sat listless, leaning against each other.The long fingers of the sun touched their foreheads. (Page 159) My Antonia is one of my preferred books because of how it is so descriptive. I love the visuals that Cather adds like when she says the bark of the oaks turned red as copper, because you think of that rustic color and how that is what the bark looks likes because of the sunset. Cather uses similes like, Out in the stream the sandbars glittered like glass, and the light tremb led in the willow thickets as if minuscular flames were leaping among them. You can really imagine glittering glass, mostly from experience, and how the little mirrors cast precious twinkles of light on water, and the little flames jumping just about the thickets casting a brilliant light on them and going out as soon as theyve touched them. Cather also uses a parable when describing the curly grass by saying that it was on fire, which is a long description of how the light from the sunset affected the grass, making it look ablaze.She uses some other metaphor when describing the light from the sun, and calls it fingers which touched the girls foreheads because the rays were long and were as if they were caressing their faces like a hand might do in a agreeable gesture. You can just see the last bits of light the sun gives off reaching out to grasp and influence the last part of the man that it can before it has to disappear into the night sky.