When I read the story “Death by Landscape” by Margaret Atwood, it made me feel sad but also inspiring of how it went out according to the incidents that can happen to anyone of us. In my opinion, it was an interesting story. I fell like the story kind of showed the importance to the fear of losing a loved or a special one. The story is about a widowed character named Lois. She looks back at her childhood spent in the Canadian wilderness. Her apartment is filled with paintings of wild landscapes she has collected over the years. Although, Lois purchased the pieces because she liked them, and they are now considered valuable, they make her feel uneasy. As a young girl, her summers were spent at camp Manitou in the wilderness of Canada, where
This could be interpreted as a journey into the true Canadian wilderness. Camp Manitou could represent a civilized and safe point, a point of no return or the frontier, in the short story.
The theme death has always played a crucial role in literature. Death surrounds us and our everyday life, something that we must adapt and accept. Whether its on television or newpaper, you'll probobly hear about the death of an individual or even a group. Most people have their own ideas and attitude towards it, but many consider this to be a tragic event due to many reasons. For those who suffered greatly from despair, living their life miserably and hopelessly, it could actually be a relief to them. Death effects not only you, but also those around you, while some people may stay unaffected depending on how they perceive it.
Mary Oliver’s poem, “Sleeping in the Forest,” presents a peaceful and vivid representation of death and its relationship with nature. As the poem begins, the reader is introduced to the earth welcoming the speaker back into the realm of nature. Man was created from the dust of the earth and when we die, our bodies return to the dust. However, this poem presents a more beautiful image of what death is composed of. Death is often portrayed as being frightening and disturbing. When individuals are presented with the thought of death, they often push this thought away out of fear and ignorance. Everyone will die someday whether we ignore the thought of death or not. However, Oliver creates a relaxing and welcoming image for the reader on what death (ideally) is. Obviously, since Oliver is still alive, she doesn’t know what death feels like. However, the way she describes death, I hope that it feels like sleeping in a forest; full of stars and enchantment.
This story begins in the spring of 1914. “Lesia’s Dream” by Laura Langston begins when the Magus family, which consists of Lesia, Papa, Mama, Ivan, Sonia, and later on, Adam, decide to immigrate to Manitoba, Canada from Ukraine. They bought some 160 acres of scrub woodland for ten dollars Canadian. This was Lesia and Ivan’s idea. They arrived on a boat ride that was very dreadful; many people died. The Magus’ idea of Canada was that it would be alluring and welcoming. Their nickname for it was “the land of milk and honey.” When they arrive, they are expected to live in a drafty,
Edna St. Vincent Millay’s “Thou famished grave” and “Mindful of you” both include the themes of death, however, “Thou famished grave” uses the personification of a grave as a starving beast, diction to add imagery of starvation, and an image of a strong will to live to show the resentfulness and bitterness that the speaker has towards death, while, “Mindful of you” uses the imagery and personification of the four seasons to remember someone close who has died, to express that although death may take people physically, but they live and are remembered through memories.
In one's life, for many, the place means everything. In the novel Blank by Trina St Jean, a young teen looses her memory after an upsetting accident and spends the novel trying to figure out what happened. Jessica's life is set in her family farm and surrounding forest. Setting is crucial to her story because of her love for nature, her accident, and her runaway plan. To begin, Jessica’s family farm is the perfect place for a nature lover like Jessica, it could be that living on the farm made her develop her love, or that is grew over time. Nonetheless, the farm is a crucial setting to the story: “After taking the first photo it starts to come back to me. Not a memory, but a feeling. Like I’ve done this before” (St. Jean 189). Here it is seen
Atwood uses simple, but effective imagery to engage the senses of the reader, for example: ‘[…] that is a fish, blue and flat’ (l. 4). These images grow more elaborate and it becomes clear that she uses metaphors and simile to convey more intricate ideas. As the speaker confesses that there is more to the world than they let on, the use of enjambment, repetition and punctuation directs the focus on certain words and gives the poem certain acuteness and urgency as the pace increases: ‘Once you have learned these words | you will learn that there are more |words than you can ever learn.’ (l. 21-23).
Robert Frost's deeply-rooted beliefs in nature influence him to view death positively. Through enticing images of solitude
“Death By Landscape” by Margaret Atwood this story is about Lois and how she was with her best friend Lucy at summer camp named Camp Manitou. Lois was ten when she met Lucy for the first time and they were Blue Jays at this camp Lucy was from Chicago where Lois was from Canada. The girls were getting ready to go on their first canoe trip which was led by Kip and Pat which was going to last for a week. they had a clear canoe route that was marked on a map and they went over it. They got to their second campsite where Lookout point was were Lucy and Lois wanted to take a look at they told Kip they're going to take a look. After climbing up they reached the top and Lucy says "It would be quite a dive off here"(Atwood 2977) Lois replies "you'd
Death by Landscape is a short story, written by Margaret Atwood in 1990. The Author is a Canadian novelist, poet and essayist as well as an environmental activist and feminist with many national and international awards for her writings and activities. She was born in Ottawa, Canada and started to write when she was six years old. At the age of 16 she already knew that she wants to become a professional writer. She grew up in the outback of northern Quebec, maybe that’s the reason for her love to nature and northern environments and this is what builds the frame of most of her works. The story was first published in 1991 and is a part of
Margaret Atwood is a Canadian poet and novelist. She was born in 1939 in Ottawa, Canada and has written over forty fiction books in addition to poems and critical essays (2013-17, Margaret atwood biography). Her book of poetry, The Journals of Susanna Moodie (1970) was inspired by a dream Atwood had of Susanna Moodie. Moodie was an English writer who immigrated to Canada in 1832 with her husband in order to secure a better life for her growing family. Atwood had read Moodie’s book Roughing It In The Bush prior to her dream that inspired her to write her own book of poetry about the immigrant woman. Moodie’s book is centered around six various stories that she wrote at different points in her life. Similarly, Atwood broke her book of poetry
Everyone feels burdened by life at some point. Everyone wishes they could just close their eyes and make all the problems and struggles of life disappear. Some see death as a release from the chains and ropes with which the trials and tribulations of life bind the human race. Death is a powerful theme in literature, symbolized in a plethora of ways. In "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Eve" Robert Frost uses subtle imagery, symbolism, rhythm and rhyme to invoke the yearning for death that the weary traveler of life feels.
It Doesn’t matter if the short story was based on true events or not. When its written about death or losing loved ones, it always reminds you of the people that were so close at once and then gone forever. Many people all over the world deal with their feelings of losing someone. So people cry, and some keep the emotions in and let it burn inside. “A Few Things Wrong with Me” by Lydia Davis and “Harrison Bergeron” by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. and “Harvey’s Dream” by Stephen King are three examples of how character’s have lost their loved ones in a different way. Some were killed and some were faded away. It also shows unhappy & happy relationships. Two of the three books also have a comparison of people that have problems in their life or forced to be in a problem. These three short stories are written from different authors perspective and have difficult plots but there is one thing that gathers them together, it is the despair that was left in their souls by the loved ones. In these three short stories a person dies or has left someone forever, but all in different aspects. Loosing a person that had a spot in your life isn’t an easy thing to forget but also leaves a mark in your heart forever. Two the three books also have a comparison of people that have problems in life or forced to be in a problem
The experiences we have in childhood do much to shape our adult identity. In her novel Cat's Eye, Margaret Atwood chronicles the life of artist Elaine Risley, and through a series of flashbacks shows the reader how she became her adult self. The retrospective showing of Elaine's artwork provides a framework for the retrospective of her journey from child to adult. Because Atwood was creating a fictional character, she was free to incorporate some very dramatic events that impacted Elaine's thoughts and feelings. Most of us do not have as much drama in our lives I certainly did not and yet the people, circumstances and occurrences in our lives affect us profoundly. We create our identity by the friends we choose, the decisions we make, and the way we respond to things that happen around us. Some things happen to us, and we also make conscious choices.
Margaret Atwood creates a haunting and beautiful piece describing the experience a sad child goes through. She structures her poem by using five stanzas; two stanzas consisting of five lines, then one stanza with ten lines, and ending with two stanzas consisting of five lines. She uses simple yet powerful diction, tone, metaphors, similes, symbolism, and imagery to show the unknown speaker giving advice to a sad child. Her message/theme is sadness is a part of life and there are different ways to deal with it, but when death comes the thing that one is being sad about doesn’t matter.