The Catherian Cathedral fills in major gaps in Cather's use of the cathedral metaphor throughout her writing life, exploring and analyzing the incorporation of major elements of Gothic
cathedral design in her fiction, in characterization, light imagery and novel structure, and linking Cather's traditional cathedral images with her images of mountains and mesas. Kephart
engages in conversation with other critics on Cather, the cathedral, and religious thought. She also shows the influence of both Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry Adams on Cather's development of
the iconography, as well as Cather's associative linking of the landscape of the American Southwest with that of the south and south-central regions of France.
