This title is printed to order. This book may have been self-published. If so, we cannot guarantee the quality of the content. In the main most books will have gone through the editing process however some may not. We therefore suggest that you be aware of this before ordering this book. If in doubt check either the author or publisher’s details as we are unable to accept any returns unless they are faulty. Please contact us if you have any questions.
First published in 1902, Owen Wister’s The Virginian: A Horseman of the Plains is a genre-defining work, arguably the first western novel, in which the life of the cowboy of the Old West is romanticized. A highly fictionalized account of the Johnson County War, a dispute in 1890s Wyoming between large cattle ranchers and smaller operators over land use, Wister’s novel is the story of a tall and handsome cowboy known only as the Virginian. At the outset of the novel we meet the Virginian through the words of an unnamed narrator at Medicine Bow, Wyoming, who is to be escorted over 260 miles to the cattle ranch of Judge Henry in Sunk Creek, Wyoming. Here we also meet the story’s relentless enemy, Trampas, who accuses the Virginian of cheating during a poker game. The Virginian is a man of honor bound by a chivalric code which prevents him from dispatching of his enemies in an underhanded manner despite numerous opportunities to do so. In this novel Wister evokes the untamed world of the American frontier brilliantly depicting its struggle to retain its romantic freedom against the civilizing forces of humanity. A sentimental longing for a simpler time, which characterizes our fascination with the western genre, will swell within the reader as he turns the pages of The Virginian . This edition is printed on premium acid-free paper and includes an introduction by Struthers Burt.
