A Wagner Matinee By Willa Cather

Characters lead the story in realism stories. They focus more on what the character does and how they interact with their environment rather than following a major story line. A character by the name of Aunt Georgiana in the story “A Wagner Matinee” by Willa Cather revolves around the pigeonholed story line. I view Aunt Georgiana as a dynamic, relatable, and fragile character that undergoes major memories that give her a wake to reality. Throughout the story, Aunt Georgiana reveals herself as a frail old woman that pays no interest to her main task. Her nephew, Clark, tries to find her in the coach but she was slow moving and resulted to her being “last of the passengers to alight” (Cather, 540). Her sluggish movements gave her the image of a timid and frail senior. Eventually they arrive to Boston and it is her first visit in years, she “questioned… me absently” about the city showing no form of interest (Cather, 543). Aunt Georgiana’s tone shown the focus in her mind was in a different track than
what was her main intentions in Boston. Clark can identify that she had no interest in the errands but mainly about her home such as when she “was chiefly concerned that she had forgotten to leave instructions about feeding....a certain weakling calf” (Cather, 543). I perceive that Aunt Georgiana is a woman that doesn't seem to invest in anything else but her farm and she puts out a dull appearance to accompany the idea. Once the two reach the auditorium, Georgiana undergoes a memory that causes her to review her life and its choices.
The musicians begin to set up and “gave a little stir of anticipation and looked with quickening interest” and once the music played she “clutched my coat sleeve” (Cather, 543-4). The character undergoes the memory trip and changes perspective on the situation. It adds that Georgiana has another life that was not similar to her current lifestyle. It goes with my idea that Georgiana was under tension that needed to be triggered. Clark observes her in the memory trip and noted that she was carried “out where the myriad graves are” (Cather 546). It goes with the idea that Georgiana was under a major change and was noticing what she missed in her life. People in the time period have experienced change especially since it was the Industrial Revolution. The time period included major population movements, production changes, and the transcontinental
railroad. Georgiana went with the ideas that she was fragile, dynamic, and relatable. Before her trip to the auditorium, she was dreading her trip and had no investing toward anything outside of her farm. She immediately changed once she heard the music playing that jogged her memory. It reminded her of what she had lost. Georgiana led the main points of a character inside of a realism short story. They kept the main development with the character rather than the plot.