Other Fiction Aldrich, Bess Streeter: Spring Came on Forever. V1. 2 Mar 2011

[crutledge]

Bess Streeter Aldrich (1881-1954) was one of Nebraska's most widely read and enjoyed authors. Her writing career spanned forty-some years, during which she published over one hundred short stories and articles, nine novels, one novella, two books of short stories, and one omnibus. In her work, she emphasized family values and recorded accurately Midwest pioneering history. One of her books, "Miss Bishop," was made into the movie, "Cheers for Miss Bishop"; and her short story, "The Silent Stars Go By," became the television show, "The Gift of Love," starring Lee Remick and Angela Lansbury. Aldrich also served as a writer and consultant in Hollywood for Paramount Pictures.

Acclaimed for her 1928 novel A Lantern in Her Hand, Bess Streeter Aldrich became one of the most widely read interpreters of the prairie pioneer experience. In 1935, she published her masterpiece, Spring Came on Forever, a novel of two Nebraska pioneer families from settlement to the 1930s. Elsewhere an artist of the romance, here Aldrich turns romance on its head.

The heroine is Amalia Holmsdorfer, one of a band of German immigrants who settle on the prairie. From her late teens to her mid-eighties she confronts and defeats the forces of nature and society that discourage or ruin others. Her life might be a modest triumph but for one detail: she married the wrong man.

Quickly paced and precisely drawn, this novel is Aldrich's greatest tribute to the complexity, humor, endurance, and intelligence of the people who settled the prairie. Whatever its sentiments, it has as many cutting edges as a buzz saw.