Epigraphs are like little appetizers to the great entrée of a story. They illuminate important aspects of the story, and they get us headed in the right direction.
O Pioneers! comes with not one, but two epigraphs. Let's check 'em out.
Prairie Spring
Evening and the flat land,
Rich and somber and always silent;
The miles of fresh-plowed soil,
Heavy and black, full of strength and harshness;
The growing wheat, the growing weeds,
The toiling horses, the tired men;
The long empty roads,
Sullen fires of sunset, fading,
The eternal, unresponsive sky.
Against all this, Youth,
Flaming like the wild roses,
Singing like the larks over the plowed fields,
Flashing like a star out of the twilight;
Youth with its insupportable sweetness,
Its fierce necessity,
Its sharp desire,
Singing and singing,
Out of the lips of silence,
Out of the earthy dusk.
What's up with the First Epigraph?
Okay. We know it might be tempting to skip over this and go straight to the main event. But it's definitely worthwhile to spend some time reading and thinking about this poem, which Cather wrote herself. When we give it some thought, we see that "Prairie Spring" helps create the atmosphere of O Pioneers!
Let's take a look. The poem begins with a description of the prairie landscape that evokes feelings of stasis and groundedness, with a hint of sadness—the land is "always silent," "heavy and black," "sullen," "eternal, unresponsive." Sounds like a funeral or something, right?
But then, it all changes. "Youth" bursts onto the scene like a wildfire. "Flaming," "singing" and "flashing," the energy of youth totally upsets the somber stasis of the land. But who or what is this "youth"? In this case, youth seems to indicate an abstract quality, rather than a specific person or group of people. Check out these similes: "like the wild roses," "like the larks over the plowed fields," "like a star out of twilight." There's no sign of anything human here.
Well, let's move on to the last two lines of the poem: "Out of the lips of silence, / Out of the earthy dusk." When we read this, it almost sounds like "youth" is emerging like a colorful crop out of the silent land, as if nature itself has opened its "lips" and produced all this "singing and singing." So what we have here is not so much two dueling forces, youth vs. nature, but an evolution: first the land is silent, asleep, then it awakens and gives birth to the wild energy of youth.
What does all this have to do with the novel? On the one hand, it refers to the dramatic transformation the natural landscape undergoes in O Pioneers! From a barren wasteland in the first part, the prairie becomes a lush paradise. But on the other hand, this youthful energy also suggests a burst of uncontrollable joy and human desire, foreshadowing the tragic love affair between Emil and Marie.
That way, the poem creates an interesting parallel between the whims of human beings and the whims of the land itself. The land is not merely a background, but an integral part of human action. But how? Are human desires and longings simply part of nature, then, or a disruptive anomaly? Well, right there, fellow explorers of Shmoop, is one of the central issues in O Pioneers! That is, the relationship between human desires and the timeless, impersonal will of nature, and the question whether the former is ever really liberated from the latter.
And Here We Have Epigraph #2
"Those fields, colored by various grain!" Mickiewicz
What's Up with the Second Epigraph?
This line appears cited on the title page.
So who is this Mickiewicz guy, anyway? Adam Mickiewicz (1798-1855) was a Polish poet of the 19th century. He's famous for his epic poem Pan Tadeusz, a nationalistic celebration of his homeland, which was part of the Russian empire during his lifetime. If that sounds like your thing, you can find an online version here.
On the surface, it sounds like this line is about, well, fields of grain. There are fields of grain in O Pioneers! And there are fields of grain in Pan Tadeusz. But what exactly is the point of an epigraph like this? What's the connection between Nebraska and Poland?
Like we said, Pan Tadeusz is a romantic vision of the poet's homeland. Well, guess what? That sounds an awful lot like O Pioneers! While we can't give a perfect explanation as to why Cather chose Mickiewicz for her epigraph, their two works appear to have a common aim. Like Pan Tadeusz, Cather's O Pioneers! celebrates the environment she called home for much of her life.
But wait—there's more. Mickiwiez was also a political figure, who spent much of his life exiled from his home country. Now, it would be a stretch to call Cather a political figure. But political debates do play a prominent role in O Pioneers! (check out "Theme: Society and Class" and our section on "Tone").
Cather did, though voluntarily, leave her Nebraskan homeland and move east, to pursue a career in cities like Pittsburgh and New York City. Including this epigraph could be a way of labeling herself an exile, like Mickiewicz, someone nostalgic for the land of her youth. For more on Cather's nostalgia, take a look at our section on "Tone."