Willa Cather 
The Song of the Lark (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 1915, ’The Song of the Lark’ is a novel by American author Willa Cather and perhaps her most autobiographical work.



“The Song of the Lark” tells the story of Thea Kronborg, a young Scandinavian-American woman’s awakening as an artist against the backdrop of the western landscape, an artist’s growth and development from childhood to maturity. More particularly—and decidedly more rarely—it traces the development of a female artist supported by a series of male characters willing to serve her career.



Thea struggles to escape from the confines her small Colorado town to the world of possibility in the Metropolitan Opera House. Throughout the book, she grows up, learning herself, her strengths and her talent, until she reaches success.



Inspired by Willa Cather’s own development as a novelist and by the career of an opera diva, “The Song of the Lark” examines the themes of the artist’s relationship with family and society, themes that would dominate all of Cather’s best fiction.

In classic Cather style, the novel is the beautiful, unforgettable story of American determination and its inextricable connection to the land.