Seeking a Felicitous Space on the Frontier. The Progression of the Modern American Woman in O. E. Rö

This monograph seeks to reconstruct the culture of the pioneer woman as presented in O. E. Rölvaag’s Giants in the Earth, Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie, and Willa Cather’s My Ántonia. Essentially, the textual analyses show the pioneer woman’s evolving and dynamic reaction to both felicitous space and the open spaces of the western frontier as she progresses from completely loathing to totally embracing vast spaces. The texts discussed demonstrate the genesis and growth of the modern American, independent woman who successfully negotiated the volatile topics of gender and space.



Lance Weldy received his Ph.D. in English in 2004, specializing in American and Children’s literature. He is Assistant Professor of Children’s Literature at Francis Marion University in Florence, South Carolina. A 2006-2007 Fulbright Fellow lecturer at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe Universität in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, he contributed to and edited an anthology of essays called From Colonialism to the Contemporary: Intertextual Transformation in World Children’s and Youth Literature. His next edited book of essays, Crossing Textual Boundaries in International Children’s Literature, is forthcoming. He has also attended national and international scholarly conferences in American and Children’s Literature, often presenting on the topics of Transformation and Intertextuality.