Zusammenfassung
Zusammenfassung von Das Lied der Lerche
Go deeper: the whole of Das Lied der Lerche
About 10 h 30 min to read.Für wen es gedacht ist
Readers who love stories of young people finding their calling will enjoy this novel, especially those drawn to music, teachers, railroads, and the American West.
Worum es in diesem Buch geht
What would it take for a girl from a sand-blown Colorado railroad town to sing on the greatest stage in New York? The book opens on a winter night in Moonstone. Dr. Howard Archie is called to the parsonage to deliver the preacher's seventh child, and there he finds eleven-year-old Thea Kronborg burning with pneumonia in a cold back room.
The Song of the Lark is a novel by Willa Cather, published in 1915. She shows how an artist is made, and she follows Thea from a crowded parsonage to Chicago and on to a canyon of ruined cliff houses in Arizona.
In dieser Zusammenfassung
- 1A fevered child meets her first true friendFree
- 2A drunken old teacher recognizes her talent
- 3Moonstone is a town of many worlds
- 4A railroad conductor opens up the desert
- 5Success and loss come to the girl early
- 6Chicago brings poverty, a new teacher, and music
- 7Cheap success makes a lonely, angry student
- 8A canyon of ruined houses gives her a new self
- 9Art takes a person away from her family
- 10Six parts, a shell and a song
Punkt 1 von 10
A fevered child meets her first true friend
The story begins on a snowy night in Moonstone. Dr. Archie walks to the parsonage with Peter Kronborg, the preacher, who is about to become a father for the seventh time.
After the birth, he hears hard breathing from a room in the wing of the house. There he finds Thea, with two yellow braids and blazing eyes. Her father forgot to mention her cold. The doctor is angry at the neglect and moves her into the warm parlor. He wraps her chest in a hot flaxseed plaster and sews it closed. For four days he fears she may die, and then she recovers.
The friendship that grows from that night is full of small private signals. He brings her Malaga grapes in a paper bag, and they share a code of winks. Mrs. Kronborg, calm and practical, watches and approves.
The takeaway: one person who believes in a child early can change the whole course of her life.
That’s 1 of 10 key points.
The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
- Nothing to pay today · Renews every year
- We email you before you pay
- Cancel online in two clicks
Go deeper: the whole of Das Lied der Lerche
About 10 h 30 min to read.Who’s who
- Thea Kronborg
- A preacher's daughter in Moonstone with a strong will and a remarkable voice, who wants to make something of herself in music.
- Dr. Howard Archie
- A kindly Moonstone physician in an unhappy marriage, who saves Thea's life as a child and stays her lifelong friend.
- Professor Wunsch
- A worn, drinking German music teacher who recognizes Thea's gift and wants her to find the spirit behind the notes.
- Ray Kennedy
- A freight-train conductor and self-taught freethinker who loves the Southwest and hopes someday to marry Thea.
- Spanish Johnny
- A gifted Mexican painter and mandolin player in Moonstone, drawn to singing and to running away.
- Andor Harsanyi
- A Hungarian pianist in Chicago who teaches Thea and sees that her real instrument is her voice.
- Fred Ottenburg
- A cheerful brewer's son and music lover who finds Thea engagements and sends her to a ranch in Arizona.
- Tillie Kronborg
- Thea's romantic, talkative aunt, who believes in her niece's future long before anyone else does.
About this edition
Every format is free to start, and print and large print are at cost.
- LengthAbout 156,000 words
- Reading timeAbout 10 h 20 min
- FormatseBook, large-print eBook, audiobook, 15-minute summary
- LanguagesEnglish and 13 other languages
Questions about Das Lied der Lerche
What is The Song of the Lark about?
It follows Thea Kronborg, a minister's daughter from a small Colorado town, as she grows from a gifted child into a serious singer, studying in Chicago, resting in Arizona, and heading toward a career in opera.
Who is Thea Kronborg based on?
Cather drew on the careers of real opera singers of her time, especially the Swedish-American soprano Olive Fremstad, but Thea is an invented character with her own Moonstone childhood and family.
What does the title The Song of the Lark mean?
It comes from a painting Thea loves at the Art Institute in Chicago, showing a young girl in a field at dawn. The picture stands for hope, longing, and the first call of art.
Is The Song of the Lark easy to read?
The prose is clear and vivid, and the story moves through short scenes. Cather describes each place, from a parsonage to a canyon, so well that you feel at home in it quickly.
Where does the novel take place?
It begins in Moonstone, a Colorado railroad town in the sand hills, and moves to Chicago, a ranch and canyon in Arizona, and later to New York and the world of opera.
Cite this edition
Cather, Willa. The Song of the Lark. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-song-of-the-lark.
Cather, W. (2026). The song of the lark. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-song-of-the-lark (Original work published 1915)
Cather, Willa. The Song of the Lark. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-song-of-the-lark.
@book{cather2026song,
author = {Cather, Willa},
title = {The Song of the Lark},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-song-of-the-lark},
note = {First published 1915}
}
