Willa Cather 
My Mortal Enemy (Annotated) 

• This edition includes the following editor’s introduction: Willa Cather, an analysis of the literature of a free and empowered woman

First published in 1926, “My Mortal Enemy” is the eighth novel by American author Willa Cather. Cather sketches a character study of a woman and a life not particularly well-lived. In this slim work, the story of an ill-considered marriage unfolds.



In “My Mortal Enemy, ” Cather’s narrating alter ego, this time a young woman called Nellie, remembers a woman she first encountered as a teenager, Myra Henshawe. As a young woman, Myra gave up a fortune to marry for love—a boldly romantic gesture that became a legend in her family. But this worldly, sarcastic, and perhaps even wicked woman may have been made for something greater than love.

In her portrait of Myra and in her exquisitely nuanced depiction of her marriage, Cather shows the evolution of a human spirit as it comes to bridle against the constraints of ordinary happiness and seek an otherworldly fulfillment. “My Mortal Enemy” is a work whose drama and intensely moral imagination make it unforgettable.