NEVER GIVE UP: ANTONIA – A SYMBOL OF STRENGTH AND COURAGE IN 'MY ANTONIA' BY WILLA CATHER (Pages 47-53) by Ms. M. Muthu Deepa* and Dr. J. Jayachandran** in THE ENGLISH RESEARCH EXPRESS / ISSN:2321-1164 (Online); 2347-2642 (Print)

Everyone loves Willa Cather as each of her novels has some special character as nature. Willa Cather writes with a passion, a beauty, and a clarity, that is unique, and wonderful, and never failing. The characters Cather paints for us effortlessly on her exquisitely written pages are rich, alive, wonderful; examples of the essential strength and goodness and bravery and hopefulness of humanity, and Cather’s sensitive, powerful portrayal of them is magnificent. In My Antonia, she created a masterpiece that every American should read; for in Antonia is the blood, the spirit, the heart, of this country, built on the hopes and dreams of men and women who sacrificed everything for the promise of a better future. My Antonia is a remarkable one. My Antonia is the memory flows through Jim Burden from his childhood to adulthood. Despite hardship and loss and struggle and terrible mistakes, Antonia’s essence, her joy of life, her purity, her precious ability to find value and meaning in what others would dismiss as worthless, never diminish. Her optimism, determination, strength and independence of character mark her as a creature set apart from the rest of her contemporaries. Even dressed in rags and ploughing fields, there is a profundity, a grace, elegance about her. She is a force of nature, the spirit of America; she is at once simple and yet incomprehensibly complex. Keywords: special character, goodness, bravery, hopefulness of humanity, childhood to adulthood, contemporaries.