The Professor's House By Willa Cather Analysis

The concept of an American Dream has been around for a long time. The way people live their lives should be based on their passions, but many times people form false passions around objects and money. In The Professor’s House, by Willa Cather, a situation is given of a man who lives in a society built up by a 1920s American chase for money and success. This way of life eventually leads the Professor to become dissatisfied with his life despite achieving the perceived elements of success in 1920 America. Cather provides a solution to the problem the Professor faces inside the character Tom Outland. Cather shows that the 1920s American view of a successful life through materialism is not an authentic American experience and that an Authentic American experience can only be achieved by turning completely to nature. Cather draws from her own upbringing and experiences to form

If Cather did not include the Mesa people in the story the importance of the mesa would not have been less; however, they serve as a model of people completely consumed and molded by nature and the American terrain itself. Their way of life was pure and uncorrupted by1920s American consumerism. The mesa people “lived for something more than food and shelter” and were not people who were simple minded and just did not have the intelligence to live as most 1920s Americans did (Cather). The “something more” is what Cather is saying can be found or achieved by turning to nature. The mesa people had a deep understanding of humans, nature and even "the human consciousness, as we know it today, dwelt there" (Mesa Cather). Instead of rejecting the natural terrain the mesa people “built themselves into this mesa and humanized it” by forming a life and civilization in the mesa (Cather). By discovering the mesa people Outland saw a way of life that completely immersed the mesa people into the nature of the Blue