SAMPLE AUTHOR TWO PARAGRAPH ESSAY

BoBo the Clown

Mrs. McDonald

English 8-3

15 December 2008

Voice of the West

Willa Cather’s life was both interesting and varied. (TOPIC SENTENCE) Wiletta (Willa) Sibert Cather was welcomed into the world on December 7, 1873, to James and Mary Virginia Cather. She was the oldest of seven children. The Cathers lived in Winchester, Virginia. At the age of nine, Willa and her family moved to the prairie town of Red Cloud, Nebraska, the setting for many of her novels and short stories. Willa attended the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. During college, Willa worked as a columnist for the Nebraska State Journal and the Lincoln Courier and as a theater critic. After graduating in 1895, her journalistic experience took her to Pittsburg, Pennsylvania Willa taught high school there for five years and during that time experienced a tragedy. One of her students committed suicide which was the inspiration for one of her short stories. In 1904, Willa moved to New York City and worked six years for McClure Magazine as an editor. During this time, Willa began to share an apartment with Edith Lewis, a writer, and they lived together until Willa’s death. This stirred up some rumors that Willa was a lesbian. It was believed that Willa had many ‘relationships’ with women which supports the theory that she was a lesbian. In 1905, Willa wrote her first collection of short stories entitled The Troll Garden. Willa won the Pulitzer Prize in 1922 for her novel One of Ours. Willa wrote many short stories and novels, including My Antonia, which many critics say is a gift to American literature. Willa was awarded many honorary degrees from Yale, Princeton, and Berkeley. Her successes earned her the cover of Time Magazine as well as a gold medal from the National Institute of Arts and Letters. Willa Cather died on April 24, 1947 at the age of seventy-four in New York from a cerebral hemorrhage.

Willa Cather often used her own personal experiences as inspiration for the characters or settings in her stories. (TOPIC SENTENCE). One short story that correlates well with Willa’s life is “Paul’s Case: A Study in Temperament”. This story follows a misunderstood teenage boy named Paul through his troubles of finding his individuality. Paul finds refuge as an usher in a local theater, and hides from his world of pain and complexity. Stealing money from the theater, he runs away to New York hoping for a fresh start. Later caught by the police, Paul comes to grips with reality and commits suicide by jumping in front of a train. The issue in “Paul’s Case” is that people need to be sympathetic to the misunderstood, and learning the true character in a person is key to finding out who someone is. (Statement of theme) This story was inspired by one of Willa’s own students during her teaching career. Just like Paul, her student had a mysterious and complex character. He had problems with everything and everyone who crossed his path, and his problems eventually led to his suicide. (Relationship between life and writing). Willa Cather took her own life experience and turned it into this dramatic and stirring short story.