We agreed that no one who had not grown up in a little prairie town could know anything about it.

We were talking about what it is like to spend one’s childhood in little towns like these, buried in wheat and corn, under stimulating extremes of climate: burning summers when the world lies green and billowy beneath a brilliant sky, when one is fairly stifled in vegetation, in the color and smell of strong weeds and heavy harvests blustery winters with little snow, when the whole country is stripped bare and gray as sheet-iron. The dust and heat, the burning wind, reminded us of many things.

While the train flashed through never-ending miles of ripe wheat, by country towns and bright-flowered pastures and oak groves wilting in the sun, we sat in the observation car, where the woodwork was hot to the touch and red dust lay deep over everything.

He and I are old friends–we grew up together in the same Nebraska town–and we had much to say to each other. LAST summer I happened to be crossing the plains of Iowa in a season of intense heat, and it was my good fortune to have for a traveling companion James Quayle Burden–Jim Burden, as we still call him in the West. Parents may want to consider which aspects of the book might be most interesting to their own kids and use that as an entry point for discussion, should their kid be having trouble with the book in school.TO CARRIE AND IRENE MINER In memory of affections old and true Those who persevere, however, will find much to reward them, and much that's surprisingly resonant with today's experiences. Many young readers, however, particularly those reading the book under duress as a school assignment, may not have attained the perspective to appreciate some of its finer points, from the complexity of its characters and their circumstances to the quality of the writing, which is far more rich and dense than today's typical fare. Mencken famously remarked, 'No romantic novel ever written in America, by man or woman, is one half so beautiful as 'My Antonia,'' and there are plenty who agree with him. Though it's not an easy read for teen, adults often report that they appreciate this book more when they revisit it later in life.

My antonia audio