I wrote the reflection for the book I chose this year: Willa Cather's Shadows on the Rock. I include the text. I think a favorite part was that enjoyed speaking about my father a little bit...
Keeping the Home-Fires Burning:
the crucial role of Cécile Auclaire
{ REFLECTION}
By
Ana Braga-Henebry, M.A.
•
When
I first read Shadows on the Rock, I
was deeply moved. I had a bunch of little kids then, and reading provided me
with the best entertainment during those few bits of time I had for myself,
stolen away from kitchen, daily lessons, laundry, and husband. Perhaps because
I had visited Quebec previously, that French-Canadian world came easily, vivid,
in my imagination. The side anecdotes of what the missionary priests had
endured in the wilderness made the book an unforgettable read for me… and
Cécile. I shall never forget how the girl of twelve takes the reader of this
remarkable book into a world of adult hardships, politics, and sacrifice.
Indeed,
through this loving household—the young housewife and her father, an apothecary—Willa Cather brings alive a world
of the past in a manner I have seldom experienced. That world was apparently
dominated by strong male characters: the king, the count, the archbishop, the
missionary priests, and the fur trappers. Yet Cather chooses a young girl to
open for us the door into Quebec daily life in the late 1600s.
Cécile
is so very young. When Shadows on the
Rock opens, her mother has died and Cécile lives with her dad. She has left
the Ursulines’ girls school to take care of the home, doing the chores that
used to be her mother’s. She is still a child and enjoys some of the excitement
of childhood, but at the same time, she must act well beyond her years. She has
suffered the loss of her mother and baby brother and her father, the royal
apothecary in Quebec, must rely on her. They both get along, lovingly and
beautifully. She prepares his meals, stresses the need for proper dinner
attire, and makes a home for both of them in every little way. The love between
father and daughter is touching, respectful, compassionate, and one of the most
beautiful aspects of this marvelous book. Throughout
the book we find sweet moments such as this one:
He placed it in the
cabinet where he kept his medical books, then went into the salon and sank down
in his chair by the fire. Cécile knelt
on the floor beside him, resting her arms upon his knee. He bent and leaned his cheek for a moment on
her shingled brown hair.
I
have loved the writing of Willa Cather since our family lived in Nebraska.
During those years, my husband and I read quite a bit of her work, and were
enchanted especially by her two Catholic books, the marvelous and unique Death Comes to the Archbishop and Shadows on the Rock. I have often
wondered how Cather came to be so knowledgeable of things Catholic: history,
hierarchy, sacramental life. For years I had liked to believe that Sigrid
Undset, whose masterwork Well-Read Mom members read in the first year, had
influenced her. The Norwegian author Undset was a Nobel Prize winner in 1928
and a convert and ardent Catholic, and met Cather while in self-exile in NYC
during WWII. The two writers became dear friends, but I was wrong in my
supposition: Death was written prior to their meeting. In researching for this
reflection, I dug deep online and lo and behold, I found a paper by Professor
Danker of SDSU entitled “Willa Cather’s French Neighbors”! So the mystery was
solved: the author grew up in a small town populated by French-Canadians! The
stories and characters in her Catholic books were taken from real people!
Indeed she visited their homes and lived among their families!
Inasmuch
as the side anecdotal stories fill the novel with wonder, history, and beauty,
it is young Cécile who anchors the book.
Even if she falls back to the background in the epilogue, her daily work both
in the home and in the community shapes the book’s soul. I discussed Shadows with a dear friend, a young
priest and fellow Cather-admirer. In our conversation, he reminded me of the
behind-the-scenes role that Cécile plays. A role that women have played in
history from time immemorial, a role essential for humanity and for
civilization. She not only makes a home, in every sense, for their little
family—caring for the little things that kept culture and civilization
alive—but also from this home she causes Love to radiate outward. The stability
and bounty of their home spreads out to shelter and feed the poor old man, the
little wayward boy, and all who come visit. Her home is a tangible model of
what the Family is called to be by God: a cell of society, spreading Love and
Light.
Why do the townsfolk
delight in calling upon the apothecary? Because therein they find a gentleman
and a man of science who applies his art with skill, tenderness, and devotion?
Certainly. But there is more. Whether they are able to articulate it or not,
they delight in being received with dignity and respect into his home—and the existence of a home
presumes a homemaker. In
her careful, diligent, and pious (in the sense of “Pious Aeneas”) way, Cécile
keeps the home-fires burning—not only literally, but also in the sense of being
herself a little “light to lighten the darkness” of the pioneer days of Quebec.
As
a homemaker, young Cécile’s daily work has a rippling, positive effect into
many of the characters’ lives. And yet this is not the only way we see the
protagonist at work in the novel. Cécile is also the faithful assistant of her
father in the Apothecary’s business. Euclide Auclaire trusts her to be his
right-hand helper, delivering medications and medical information. At twelve
years old, she is a competent and reliable worker. She also shown as an admirer
of her father’s medical stances, sometimes against much criticism. Euclide is a
responsible, thoughtful, and dedicated professional, and in every way, Cécile
is his companion, helper, and friend.
My
own father and I were very close. As seventh of his numerous children, I like
to think that I was in a way his most ardent admirer at home. I learned so much
from following him around the house as a child, being his faithful assistant as
Cécile was with Euclide, and had long conversations with him in my youth. Just
over one year ago I was the one with him as he passed from this life to
eternity. I will be forever thankful for this privilege. I missed my own dear
mother’s passing due to distance, so with my father I enjoyed being present as
Peace filled the room and, on my knees, tears rolling, I thanked God for his
long and faithful life.
Cécile
and Euclide Auclaire, along with Laura Ingalls and Pa, Jo and Mr. March, and
Lizzy and Mr. Bennett, form one of the most endearing Father-Daughter duos I
have encountered in literature. Shadows On the Rock by Willa Cather is
an unforgettable book because it brings forth a strong, determined and
hard-working female main character, it touches on the interior life of virtue
and faith, and it portrays the effects of family love in society.
Ana
Braga-Henebry leads two WRM books clubs one hour apart from each other, and is
constantly amazed at the range of complexity of responses and difference in
opinion between the two of them. Ana received a Master’s degree in
Humanities/Aesthetic Studies from the University of Texas at Dallas, where she
studied Art and translated religious Brazilian Poetry among other things. She has
seven children ranging from 14 to 27 with her husband Geoffrey, a scientist and
academic with a Great Books background. They make their home in Laura Ingalls
country, SD, where local people are welcoming, and the winters brutal. Ana has
written reviews, plays and articles for a myriad of periodicals over the years.
Most recently Ana wrote the chapter on Geography in the recently published book
Why Should I Learn This? edited by Maureen Wittman and Erin Brown-Conroy. She publishes
occasional personal reviews and other writings in a personal blog entitled Ana
Braga-Henebry’s Journal.
1 comment:
Still waiting for my packet. Thank you for publishing your reflection on Facebook!
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