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Study Guide for Wolf
Willow
The third text for discussion in
"The Great Plains from Texas to Saskatchewan" is Wolf
Willow: A History, a Story, and a Memory of the Last Plains Frontier, by
Wallace Stegner. This is a complex and sometimes
confusing work, because it crosses genre, incorporating essay, memoir,
history, and fiction. I cannot read the book without feeling a powerful
evocation of my own autobiography, my own plains boyhood, despite the
generational difference between Stegner and me. Stegner's boyhood home of Eastend, Saskatchewan,
will be our destination in our pilgrimage during the penultimate week of the
seminar.
The frontier and the border are powerful themes in Wolf
Willow. In relation to that word, "frontier," you need to be
familiar with the great frontier historian, Frederick Jackson Turner; I've
done a web page on him for my freshman History classes. In relation to that
other word, "border," I've included Stegner
with William Stafford and others in a page on writers of the border for my
North American Plains course.
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Texts
of Wolf Willow
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Text
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Description
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New York: Viking Press, 1962
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The original text. NDSU owns a
copy of this first edition.
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Paper, Lincoln:
University of
Nebraska Press, 1980
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Bison Book edition, a facsimile
reprint of the Canadian edition published by Macmillan of Toronto. This
text will be our standard reference for the seminar.
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Exploring Wolf Willow
Our first-day discussion of the work, our initial
exploration, will be based on the commonplace entries, marginalia, and
curiosities of all of us, with designated discussion leaders facilitating the
flow. Here are some comments and questions I might put into the mix.
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Why is Stegner
coming to Eastend? What is he searching for?
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Just what IS wolf willow?
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There are historians in our group. Is History
a pontoon bridge? What's your metaphor?
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I'm fascinated by the figure of Corky
Jones--this denizen of the frontier who insists on living the life of the
mind in Eastend, and who serves a mentor to Stegner. Do you know anyone like that?
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Let's talk about how Stegner
lays out the geography of his homes, and about gender.
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Let's talk, too, about the Medicine
Line--about the border, and conceptions of life on either side. What
distinguishes the Canadian prairies from the American?
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As something of an authority on gopher
killing, I'd like to talk about that, and about other interactions with
wildlife in the book.
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Enlightening
Wolf Willow: (Suggested) Reports
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Subject
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Sources
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Frederick Jackon Turner and his
writings on the frontier in American history are key
to understanding Stegner--both his hopes and his
discouragements. What's the relationship between Wolf Willow and
Turner?
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Benson, Wallace Stegner
Turner, Frontier and Section
Bogue,
Strange Roads Going Down
The Turner
Theses
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Somebody needs to look into Stegner's debt to Proust.
It's that relationship between the senses and memory. Stegner's
students, too, have the same fixation.
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Proust, Remembrance of
Things Past
McMurtry,
Walter Benjamin at the Dairy Queen and Duane's Depressed
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Stegner
portrays life in a town such as Eastend (Whitemud) as vigorous, and yet boorish—not much there
as to intellectual life or activity.
Is this an accurate portrayal?
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Voisey, Vulcan
Nelson, After the West Was Won
Miner, West of Wichita
Community histories in the Institute
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Especially considering Stegner’s advocacy in adult life of the wilderness movement,
the environmental attitudes and circumstances portrayed in Wolf Willow
are significant. What were settlers’
attitudes toward the environment? Is
Stegner’s portrayal accurate and fair?
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Fleharty, Wild Animals and
Settlers
County extension records, NDSU Archives
Isern, “Gopher Tales”
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Extending Wolf
Willow: (Suggested) Reports
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Subject
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Sources
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There is a great theme running through Stegner's work, a post-frontier theme--that man (gender specificity intentional) will destroy what
he most loves. It's in the chapter on the Metis,
and it's in the chapter on paths. It's interesting to trace this theme
through related works of fiction and History.
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McMurtry, Lonesome Dove
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The geography of boyhood on the plains is a topic shared
by Stegner and W.O. Mitchell. Extended to
adolescence, it also invites comparison to McMurtry.
Are all the boys of the plains sensuous little savages?
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Mitchell, Who Has Seen the Wind
Mitchell, What I Did on
Summer Holiday
McMurtry,
Horseman, Pass By
McMurtry, The Last Picture
Show
Memoirs in the Institute
collection
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Stegner’s portrayal of
childhood on the plains is, of course, gendered. What about the girls? Was there anything distinctive about
girlhood on the plains?
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Rozum,
Schwieder, Growing Up with
the Town
Plotkin,
The Pearson Girls
Kelley, “Ada Soule”
Memoirs in the Institute collection
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Is it possible to be an author and intellectual in a
small town? Reading Stegner's final chapter, we'd
have to say not. What, then, of major plains authors who have taken up
residence in the region and worked well here?
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Sharon Butala, Perfection
of the Morning
Kathleen Norris, Dakota: A Spiritual Geography
Woiwode,
Hasselstrom, Windbreak
and other works
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Stegner is a hero to the
wilderness movement in America. What was his importance to the
movement? Can you see the roots of
his environmentalism in Wolf Willow?
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Benson, Wallace Stegner
Mark Harvey, NDSU faculty—interview
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Home Page of the Seminar
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