By Debra L. Cumberland (Editor)
Willa Cather's The tune of the Lark, the most recent in Rodopi's discussion sequence, is a suite of 13 new essays exploring Cather's 1915 vintage novel in regards to the coming-of-age of Thea Kronborg, a proficient younger opera singer. As in earlier variations within the discussion sequence, this quantity on Cather's novel deals analyses by means of either new and rising students on complicated and arguable concerns. particular components of concentration contain: the position of the West and the railroad, race and race relatives, the appearing arts, in addition to Cather's advanced development of "culture" through the novel. Thea's function as a potential feminist icon gets a clean, insightful glance, whereas different writers discover the character of present and gift-giving in addition to the novel's relation to different literary routine and genres. students and most of the people will welcome the methods those new serious insights supply a clean examine this glossy vintage.
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Extra info for Willa Cather's the Song of the Lark
Example text
1 Interestingly, the pathology of the throat is hinted at only a few pages into the novel when Dr. Archie gives Thea’s father, the minister, a troche for his cough: “‘Have a troche, Kronborg,’ he said, producing some. ‘Sent me for samples. Very good for a rough throat’” (SL 9). So far the throat specialist is nothing but a vague and distant figure and is only mentioned in connection with Thea’s father and not herself. Treacherously enough, the significance of this seemingly harmless reference to the throat specialist may be realized only in retrospect and therefore Dr.
In the same conversation, Thea also indicates she would have saved herself “a lot of trouble” had she died from pneumonia as a child. While this statement appears superficially as a mere wry remark from the world-weary diva, Thea may actually be expressing an insightful truth. After all, she has been going to the “trouble” of dying for her genius ever since then. In fact, in its final, most successful incarnation, Thea’s genius is completely disembodied: it has become commodified and collectible in the form of phonograph records.
This is an activity Dr. Archie has been engaged in throughout the novel. Like Laennec, who could not wait to have his diagnosis confirmed as soon as the patient was dead, Dr. Archie is impatient to do the same with Thea Kronborg. He wants to identify the body so that he can use a metaphorical scalpel to find visual proof of his diagnosis since “only in the patient’s death The Pathology of Voice 35 could vision again take hold as the primary sense used by doctors for diagnosis” (Sterne 122). The Song of the Lark may be read as a protracted medical examination; although the patient is the same, the identity of the examiner is not; a whole fraternity of male figures is allowed to probe Thea Kronborg’s body.