Themes and Characters
My Life in Dog Years is an autobiography because it is about Paulsen’s relationship with dogs, but the dogs are the stars of the book. […]
Month: December 2008
Literary Qualities
Paulsen is a sort of poet of the wilderness, and he paints pictures of it in spare sentences that are vibrant with color, as in […]
Social Sensitivity
This book is primarily about a man’s relationship with dogs. Paulsen makes few attempts to universalize his experiences; he does say that he believes dogs […]
Ideas and Topics for Papers
TOPICS FOR DISCUSSION 1. What was the most important thing Snowball gave Paulsen? Why would Snowball remain fresh in his memory 50 years later? 2. […]
Related Titles and Adaptations
Eastern Sun, Winter Moon offers a fuller account of Paulsen’s life in the Philippines and Snowball than does My Life in Dog Years. Paulsen says […]
Introduction
Willa Cather’s My Antonia (1918) is the story of both Antonia Shimerda, a Bohemian immigrant to the state of Nebraska in the 1880s, and the […]
Willa Cather
Born in Virginia in 1873, Willa Cather spent the first decade of her life on her family’s farm in Back Creek Valley. In 1884, her […]
Plot Summary
A Introduction Willa Cather’s My Antonia begins in the voice of an unnamed narrator who “introduces” not only the novel but also Jim Burden, whose […]
Characters
A Jim Burden As narrator, Jim Burden is Cather’s persona-that is, he serves as a stand-in for the author. He comes to Nebraska at about […]