So Big

SO BIG
by Edna Ferber

 Award: Pulitzer Winner 1925

 Dates Read: March 14, 2007 & July 16, 2017

 So Big follows the life of Selina, who begins her independence as a school teacher in a rural farming community, quickly meets and then marries a farmer named Pervus. Of course, the whole time I'm thinking why marry so fast? From reading, I just never got the sense that she was madly in love with him.

 They soon have a child together, Dirk, who she nicknames "So Big," hence the title of the novel. Pervus is not long for this world and dies, leaving Selina and Dirk to fend for themselves. Selina works herself to the bone on the farm, determined to give Dirk a future. The novel from this point focuses more on Dirk and him falling in love with his wife, Dallas, and money, yet ultimately being abandoned by his wife and realizing the wisdom of his mother and her artistic values.

 Yet, my enjoyment came from Selina through and through. The imagery of her toiling in the soil on her own, picking and hauling her crops to market, where only men typically went was so vivid I'm surprised I didn't have dirt under my own fingernails. Selina is a pillar of strength and grit and I could feel the exhaustion and desperation.

 Ferber was never confident about this work and felt the plot was weak. She remarked that So Big was the "...story of the triumph of failure." I couldn't agree more. Although she warned her publishers they may want to skip publishing this gem, Doubleday loved the story  and it sold incredibly well as a mass-market paperback and went on to win the Pulitzer. Love it!

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