Table of Contents
From the Pages of
The Virginian
I had stepped into a world new to me indeed, and novelties were occurring with scarce any time to get breath between them. As to where I should sleep, I had forgotten that problem altogether in my curiosity. What was the Virginian going to do now? I began to know that the quiet of this man was volcanic.
(page 23)
“When you call me that,
smile!”
(page 33)
For though utterly a man in countenance and in his self-possession and incapacity to be put at a loss, he was still boyishly proud of his wild calling, and wore his leathern chaps and jingled his spurs with obvious pleasure.
(page 61)
“Do you call it a manly thing to frighten and distress women because you—for no reason at all? I should never have imagined it could be the act of a person who wears a big pistol and rides a big horse. I should be afraid to go riding with such an immature protector.”
(page 103)
“Oh, pshaw! When yu’ can’t have what you choose, yu’ just choose what you have.”
(page 115)
What would the Virginian do to Trampas? Would it be another intellectual crushing of him, like the frog story, or would there be something this time more material—say muscle, or possibly gunpowder—in it?
(page 157)
‘When a man ain’t got no ideas of his own,” said Scipio, “he’d ought to be kind o’careful who he borrows ’em from.”
(page 199)
“Pity this isn’t New York, now, where there’s a big market for harmless horses. Gee-gees, the children call them.”
(page 214)
He had told her that he was coming for his hour soon. From that hour she had decided to escape. She was running away from her own heart. She did not dare to trust herself face to face again with her potent, indomitable lover. She longed for him and therefore she would never see him again.
(page 234)
“You must not stay—” Weakness overcame him, and his eyes closed. She sat ministering to him, and when he roused again, he began anxiously at once: “You must not stay. They would get you, too.”
(page 241)
Dead men I have seen not a few times, even some lying pale and terrible after violent ends, and the edge of this wears off; but I hope I shall never again have to be in the company with men waiting to be killed.
(page 278)
“He says with apparent pride,” wrote Sarah, “that he has ‘never killed for pleasure or profit.’ Those are his exact words, and you may guess their dreadful effect upon mother. I congratulate you, my dear, on having chosen a protector so scrupulous.”
(page 308)
“I am not going to let him shoot me.”
(page 339)
Something had changed. He looked everywhere, and feeling it everywhere, wondered what this could be. Then he knew: it was the sun that had gone entirely behind the mountains, and he drew out his pistol.
(page 344)
“A Western man is a good thing. And he generally knows that. But he has a heap to learn. And he generally don’t know that.”
(page 356)
BARNES & NOBLE CLASSICS
NEW YORK
Published by Barnes & Noble Books
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New York, NY 10011
The Virginian:
A Horseman of the Plains was first published in 1902.
The current text is taken from Wister’s revised edition of 1911.
Published in 2005 by Barnes & Noble Classics with new Introduction, Notes, Biography, Chronology, Inspired By, Comments & Questions, and For Further Reading.
Introduction
Copyright © 2005 by John G. Cawelti.
Note on Owen Wister, The World of Owen Wister and
The Virginian,
Notes, Inspired by
The Virginian,
Comments & Questions, and For Further Reading Copyright @ 2005 by Barnes & Noble, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Barnes & Noble Classics and the Barnes & Noble Classics colophon are trademarks of Barnes & Noble, Inc.
The Virginian
ISBN-13: 978-1-59308-236-9 ISBN-10: 1-59308-236-3
eISBN : 978-1-411-43343-4
LC Control Number 2005929145
Produced and published in conjunction with:
Fine Creative Media, Inc.
322 Eighth Avenue
New York, NY 10001
Michael J. Fine, President and Publisher
Printed in the United States of America
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FIRST PRINTING
Owen Wister
Owen Wister was born on July 14, 1860, into a wealthy and distinguished Philadelphia family. His father, a physician, could trace his ancestors’ arrival in Pennsylvania to several months earlier than that of the state’s founder, William Penn. Owen’s maternal grandmother was the famous actress Fanny Kemble. As a boy he attended boarding schools in Switzerland as well as the prestigious St. Paul’s School in New Hampshire.
In 1878 Wister enrolled at Harvard University, where against his father’s wishes he majored in classical music. At Harvard he met Theodore Roosevelt, the future U.S. president, and the two became lifelong friends. Wister graduated from Harvard summa cum laude and went to Europe to continue his studies in music and composition. He gave up his dream of a musical career after only a few years, however, and returned to the United States. He worked for a time in an investment banking firm and then, in 1885, enrolled at Harvard Law School.
Before beginning law school Wister, suffering from a nervous disorder, spent the summer on a ranch in Wyoming on the advice of his doctor. He was immediately taken with the country. Over the next decade, despite three years of law school and a brief stint working as a lawyer, he made several more trips to the West, traveling throughout Wyoming, Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, and California. He kept a detailed written account of the landscape and its inhabitants, from cattle rustlers to ranchers, cowboys, and American Indians.
Wister began writing stories about the American West, drawing upon his observations and experiences. His first published stories appeared in
Harper’s Monthly
in 1892. Others followed, and their popularity prompted Wister to abandon the law and devote his full attention to writing. In 1902 he brought together several of his stories, bound them with a cohesive narrative and a love story, and created his first novel,
The Virginian: A Horseman of the Plains.
The novel was an instant best-seller and became a model for the “westerns” that followed.
Over the next thirty years, Wister continued to write. He produced another novel,
Lady Baltimore
(which introduced the Lady Baltimore Cake), several volumes of short stories, works of nonfiction (including several conservative political treatises), and children’s books. None of these works, however, achieved the status of his first novel. Owen Wister died on July 21, 1938, in Rhode Island.
The World of Owen Wister and
The Virginian
1860
| Owen Wister is born on July 14 in Germantown, Pennsylvania , a suburb of Philadelphia. His father belongs to a prominent, wealthy family with roots in Philadelphia stretching back to the 1700s; his maternal grandmother is the famous actress Fanny Kemble. Abraham Lincoln is elected president.
|
1861
| The American Civil War begins.
|
1870
| Owen travels to Europe with his family and attends boarding school in Switzerland.
|
1873
| The family returns to Philadelphia. Owen is enrolled in St. Paul’s School, a prestigious boarding school in Concord, New Hampshire.
|
1878
| He graduates from St. Paul’s School and in the fall enters Harvard University. Novelist Upton Sinclair is born. Gilbert and Sullivan’s operetta H.M.S. Pinafore opens.
|
1880
| Wister meets his classmate and friend, the future president Theodore Roosevelt.
|
1882
| Wister graduates summa cum laude from Harvard with a degree in music. A talented pianist, he travels to Europe to study music composition. The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 bans Chinese immigration to the United States for ten years. American philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson dies.
|
1883
| Deciding against a career in music, Wister returns to Boston but soon moves to Philadelphia. He embarks on a career in finance. American scout and showman Buffalo Bill (William Frederick Cody) opens his “Wild West Show.” Treasure Island, by Scottish novelist Robert Louis Stevenson, is published.
|
1885
| Wister spends the summer in Wyoming at the advice of his doctor, hoping to recover from a nervous disorder. He stays at the V. R. Ranch, run by Major Frank Wolcott near Glenrock. Over the next ten years, he will return often to the West; his detailed diary of these travels will serve as source material for his stories. He enrolls in Harvard Law School. Former president and Civil War general Ulysses S. Grant dies. Novelist Sinclair Lewis is born.
|
1888
| Upon graduation from Harvard Law School, Wister returns to Philadelphia, where he works in the law office of Francis Rawle. A collection of short stories entitled Plain Tales from the Hills, by English author Rudyard Kipling, is published.
|
1889
| Wister is admitted to the bar and begins practicing law. Mark Twain’s novel A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court is published.
|
1891
| Using material from his travel journals, Wister begins writing short stories about the American West. Novelist Herman Melville dies.
|
1892
| Harper’s Monthly magazine publishes two of Wister’s stories, “Hank’s Woman” and “How Lin McLean Went East.” Wister abandons the law to become a full-time writer. American poet Walt Whitman dies.
|
1893
| In Wyoming, Wister meets painter Frederic Remington, who shares his interest in the American West.
|
1895
| The Time Machine, by English novelist H. G. Wells, is published. Wister’s collection of western stories entitled Red Men and White is published by Harper and Brothers.
|
1897
| Another of Wister’s story collections, Lin McLean, is published. Kipling’s novel Captains Courageous is published.
|
1898
| Wister marries his second cousin, Mary Channing. Henry James’s novel The Turn of the Screw is published.
|
1899
| The newlyweds summer in Saunderstown, Rhode Island. Ernest Hemingway is born.
|
1900
| Two of Wister’s works are published: a collection of western stories and sketches, The Jimmyjohn Boss, and Other Stories, and a biography, Ulysses S. Grant. Theodore Dreiser’s novel Sister Carrie is published.
|
1901
| Theodore Roosevelt is elected president.
|
1902
| The first edition of The Virginian: A Horseman of the Plains is published, dedicated to Wister’s friend Theodore Roosevelt. The novel is an instant success, selling 200,000 copies in its first year alone. The Four Feathers, by English novelist A. E. W. Mason, and The Varieties of Religious Experience, by American philosopher William James are published. John Steinbeck is born.
|
1903
| Philosophy 4: A Story of Harvard University is published.
|
1904
| Wister produces a stage version of The Virginian; the play will run for ten years.
|
1906
| Wister’s Victorian romance Lady Baltimore is published. O. Henry’s short-story collection The Four Million and Upton Sinclair’s novel The Jungle are published.
|
1908
| Wister runs unsuccessfully for councilman in Philadelphia.
|
1912
| Wister is elected to Harvard’s Board of Overseers, a post he will retain until 1925. Arizona and New Mexico become states. Woodrow Wilson defeats Theodore Roosevelt in the U.S. presidential election.
|
1913
| Mary Channing Wister dies giving birth to her sixth child, at the age of forty-four. Willa Cather’s novel O Pioneers! is published.
|
1914
| World War I begins. Booth Tarkington’s novel Penrod is published. A silent film version of The Virginian, directed by Cecil B. DeMille, opens.
|
1920
| Wister’s A Straight Deal; or, The Ancient Grudge, a treatise about relations between America and England, appears.
|
1921
| The Triumph of the Egg, a short-story collection by Sherwood Anderson, and Three Soldiers, a novel by John Dos Passos, are published.
|
1922
| Wister’s Neighbors, Henceforth, about postwar Europe, is published. Willa Cather’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, One of Ours, and T. S. Eliot’s volume of poetry, The Waste Land, appear.
|
1928
| The Writings of Owen Wister is published. Wister meets Ernest Hemingway in Wyoming; the two writers go fishing together and become friends.
|
1929
| The film version of The Virginian, starring Gary Cooper in the title role, debuts. Hemingway’s novel A Farewell to Arms and Thomas Wolfe’s novel Look Homeward, Angel are published. In October the American stock market collapses.
|
1930
| Wister publishes a memoir of his long acquaintance with Theodore Roosevelt entitled Roosevelt: The Story of a Friendship 1880-1919. William Faulkner’s novel As I Lay Dying is published. The Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act is enacted, raising import tariffs.
|
1938
| Owen Wister dies in North Kingston, Rhode Island, on July 21.
|