The Immigrant Experience

p My Antonia and the Immigrant Experience

In the 19th Century West

I : Introduction

My Antonia is the story of the narrator Jim Burden and his friendship with a young Czechoslovakian immigrant girl named Antonia Schimerda . Jim and Antonia first meet after both Jim and the Schimerda family immigrate west to Nebraska . Jim is going to live with his grandparents after being orphaned , and the Schimerda 's have just bought a farm from a fellow Czechoslovakian immigrant named Krajiek . Jim builds a friendship with Antonia and the readers come to see

the American immigrant experience through his eyes

The 19th century was a time in which many immigrants were fleeing their homelands in to come to the United States . According to Kukral (2004 ) one of the largest groups to settle the West and the Midwest at this time were the Bohemian Czech 's who had fled war and oppression in their homeland . Many of these immigrants came to the United States wishing to purchase farms in the still mostly unpopulated western United States . Kukral (2004 ) states that 75 ,000 Bohemians settled the land surrounding Cleveland Ohio alone , and that there were Czech communities throughout Ohio , Minnesota , and Nebraska . The Bohemian immigrants started settling in the West and Midwest in the 1850 's and continued to settle there throughout the remainder of the 19th century . The Schimerda 's would have been but one of these families

Antonia Schimerda like many immigrants found that life was very different in the United States from how it had been in Czechoslovakia She and other immigrants like her had been led to believe that life would be easier , and that the streets were paved with gold in America Like many other immigrants Antonia would quickly find out that , this was not true . In this , I intend to look at similarities between Antonia 's experience of life as an immigrant in 19th century America and that of other immigrants . I will also look at how Willa Cather may have idealized those experiences

II : Antonia 's Experience

In My Antonia , the Schimerda 's arrive on the train from New York with literally nothing but the clothes on their backs . They have bought land from a man named Krajiek who charged them much more than the land was worth . During the first hard year in Nebraska , the Schimerda 's live in a dugout home covered with sod . They have little to eat , and Antonia and her sister have nothing but thin cotton dresses to wear . Jim 's grandmother helps the family out with food and spare clothing as much as possible but there are communication difficulties as the Schimerda 's do not speak a great deal of English . Antonia 's father who had been a musician in Czechoslovakia begs the Burden 's to teach Antonia English Her mother does not like losing the help around the house but realizes the need for her children to speak English in to get anywhere in this new life

Antonia...