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ABOUT THE BOOK
NO SPOILERSMy Ántonia is narrated by Jim Burden, a New York lawyer who looks back on his boyhood on the Nebraska prairie. Orphaned at ten, Jim is sent to live with his grandparents near the frontier town of Black Hawk, and on the wagon ride out from the train depot he catches his first glimpse of a Bohemian immigrant family: the Shimerdas, newly arrived from the old country and clinging to each other in the dark. The eldest daughter, Ántonia, is a brown-eyed, quick-laughing girl of about twelve who speaks almost no English but manages to make herself understood. Over the seasons that follow, Jim and Ántonia roam the open grasslands together, and through her eyes he begins to feel the strangeness and beauty of the land they share. Her family's poverty, her father's quiet sadness, and the raw harshness of prairie life all press in around them, yet something in Ántonia seems to match the country itself, vast and vigorous and alive.
Free Battle of the Books questions for My Ántonia
SPOILERSEvery one of these has the same answer, and that is the point. In a real battle the question is read aloud with a dozen other books in play, and students have a few seconds to place it. Here is what a battle might ask about My Ántonia. Use them as a quiz, a trivia round, or BOTB practice.
Where in the book they come from
- Early in the book
In what book does a boy kill an enormous rattlesnake with a borrowed spade near a prairie dog town?
✓ Answer
My Ántonia by Willa Cather
Jim pounds a five and a half foot rattler to death after the immigrant girl screams a warning in Bohemian. The kill earns him her admiration and ends the superior tone she had taken with him. Later, he reflects that the snake was old and lazy and the adventure was "a mock adventure."
- First half
In what book do mourners sing "Jesus, Lover of my Soul" at a snow blanketed grave on the Nebraska prairie?
✓ Answer
My Ántonia by Willa Cather
At Mr. Shimerda's burial, grandfather offers a prayer in English at his widow's request, and grandmother whispers for Fuchs to start a hymn. The bluish air full of eddying snow makes the moment unforgettable to Jim for the rest of his life.
- First half
In what book does an Italian couple set up a dancing pavilion under cottonwood trees in a small Nebraska town?
✓ Answer
My Ántonia by Willa Cather
The Vannis pitch their tent near the Danish laundry, complete with the husband's harp and Mrs. Vanni's lavender dress and coral combs. The pavilion brings together town boys and country girls and becomes the cheerful center of summer evenings.
- Second half
In what book does a boy tell girls about a Spanish stirrup and sword turned up in a Nebraska field?
✓ Answer
My Ántonia by Willa Cather
Jim shares with the girls at the river picnic the legend that Coronado may have ridden along their river, evidenced by relics a farmer plowed up nearby.
- Second half
In what book does a student read "Optima dies…prima fugit" by lamplight in his Lincoln room?
✓ Answer
My Ántonia by Willa Cather
Jim reads the line from Virgil's Georgics the evening Lena Lingard knocks on his door, recalling his old dream of her crossing the stubble.
- Near the end
In what book does a former hired girl cook for miners in a Klondike tent for gold?
✓ Answer
My Ántonia by Willa Cather
Tiny Soderball leaves her Seattle lodging house for the Yukon gold rush and helps found Dawson City, eventually returning rich.
