Book Review- Death Comes For The Archbishop- Willa Cather

Book Review:

Death comes for the Archbishop-

Willa Cather

Father Valliant and Archbishop Jean Latour grew up together in a small French village. Both men as teenagers dedicated their lives to the Catholic Church, making a solemn vow to one another to dedicate their lives to the church. Foregoing the privileges of family and marriage, they sought a life of spirituality in service to their God. With this type of dedication it is really not surprising that they would volunteer for an assignment that would completely transform their lives and remove them from the comfort and filial comforts of their beloved France.

The American West and the Mission system established by the Spanish Fathers needed the benevolent oversight of Rome. The diocese founded by the Spaniards had been overtaken by Mexican fathers with loose renderings of the rites and lifestyle becoming of a men of the cloth.

Father Valliant and Bishop Latour were to establish a Roman presence in the New World, reforming and settling the west. The tale spun in Cathers epic is weaved from the lives of a real life Bishop from France, and experiences form other people of the period.

Reading Cather’s work is like stepping back in time. Her poetic style is soothing and mesmerizing. The work is told in a chronological fashion starting out in Rome then following the misadventures of these two men until both of their deaths. Throughout both of their experiences a sense of loneliness and isolation is revealed in both men’s lives. Valliant and Latour are two vastly different men in personality and style, yet their childhood bonds form an interdependent partnership.

The lives of the Indians and Mexican people are detailed in vivid language and sensitivity. You will not soon forget the imagery invoked by the snake worshiping rituals, or the run in with a serial killer in the mountains of New Mexico.


"He observed also that there was no longer any perspective in his memories...He was soon to have done with calendared time, and it had already ceased to count for him. He sat in the middle of his own consciousness; none of his former states of mind were lost or outgrown. They were all within reach of his hand, and all comprehensible.
Sometimes, when Magdalena or Bernard came in and asked him a question, it took him several seconds to bring himself back to the present. He could see they thought his mind was failing; but it was only extraordinarily active in some other part of the great picture of his life--some part of which they knew nothing.
When the occasion warranted he could return to the present. But there was not much present left; Father Joseph dead, the Olivares both dead, Kit Carson dead, only the minor characters of his life remained in the present time." pp 290-291
Death comes for the Archbishop is one of my favorite books due to its intimacy and the atmospheric scenery it invokes. It is majestic yet deeply personal, Grand, and small. It is about lives of purpose, and the sacrifices we all must make in order to fulfill spiritual endeavors and the loneliness that can sometimes necessitate.

Highly recommended.


5/5