Brief Summary Of My Antonia By Jim Burden

The story begins with the narrator Jim Burden, age 10, travelling by rail across the country to Nebraska. Having just lost both his parents in Virginia, he is travelling with a hired man Jake Marpole to live with his grandparents. During the journey, Jim reads the "Life of Jesse James," which he thoroughly enjoys. Jim first hears of Antonia on this journey, when a friendly conductor tells him that a Bohemian immigrant family, which can't really speak English, is going to Black Hawk, Nebraska and that they have a twelve or thirteen-year-old girl. Jim travels all day through the huge expanse of Nebraska, and in the middle of the night, they finally get off the train. There Jim catches his first glimpse of the immigrant family. Soon Otto Fuchs,

Jim wakes up in the afternoon in a small bed, with his grandmother smiling over him. She comments on how much like his father he looks, and he follows her to the kitchen to take a bath. Their home is very pleasant and clean, with flowers in the windows and plaster on the dirt walls. Jim's grandmother is energetic, with a strident, high voice, and she always seems to be thinking of something far away. His grandfather is solemn and kind, with a huge white beard and baldhead. After supper, Otto Fuchs, an Austrian cowboy, who tells him stories, teaches him how to throw a lasso, and has bought him a pony named Dude, immediately befriends Jim. Before bed, Grandfather reads in a resonant voice from the Bible for everyone in the household. The next day Jim begins to explore his new environment. Outside, sod houses and dugouts surround their frame house, and Jim looks out at the windmill, corncribs, and huge cornfield. There is red grass everywhere, and it seems like everything is in constant motion. Jim accompanies his grandmother, who is carrying a cane as protection against snakes, to the garden, and he feels like he is at the end of the

Marek, another son, is mentally challenged and has webbed fingers. Suddenly Antonia comes up to Jim, and they run through the fields hand in hand, with Yolk following them. It is very windy, and after Jim tells Antonia his name and the word for "sky," they lie down next to each other in the middle of a field and stare up at the blue sky. Antonia tries to give Jim one of her rings, but Jim does not think it is appropriate and refuses. Antonia’s father calls them back and stares deep into Jim's face. When they return to the dugout, he takes out a Bohemian-English dictionary and gives it to Jim's grandmother. Extremely earnestly, he begs her to teach Antonia English. One afternoon Jim and "Tony" are sitting outside in the sun for their English lesson. Tony begins talking about badgers and how special dogs in her native country hunt them. It is almost winter, so all the insects, except one, are dead. Tony picks the bug up and begins to speak to it in Bohemian, and it starts to chirp back at her. She begins to cry a little bit because the bug reminds her of an old beggar woman she once knew who used to sing songs for children. When they decide to go back, Antonia puts the bug in her hair. As they walk back, Jim marvels at the prairie surrounding them, covered in red grass and cornfields. Every day they walked back through the fields, and the moment seems