People often say that nature is what raises people, but it is true that we will not know how much influence the landscape has on our personality and others, especially Canadian’s relationships, until it is called culture. Two Canada texts are “The Lamp at Noon” by Sinclair Ross and “The Painted Door” by AJM Smith. Both depict two outstanding landscapes in Canada, one is the historic event of the Dust Bowl, the other is the familiar snowstorms here. At the same time, the essay clearly describes the thinking and feelings of the main characters when in that environment. When in a long-term landscape, it will more or less affect our emotions, behavior, which in turn leads to connection and interaction in other relationships. As mentioned above, …show more content…
Both authors, Ross and Smith, use images of harsh landscapes as catalysts to convey the isolating and oppressive nature of the landscapes. In “The Lamp at Noon” the harshness that the Dust Bowl brought was wind and dust, it constantly eroded everything, the strong oppression made people’s lives difficult, it was clearly shown through Ellen’s desire to escape that place. Through her pressing words to her husband Paul “What’s ahead of you here? At least we’ll get enough to eat and wear when you’re sweeping out the store. Look at it - look at it, fool. Desert – the lamp lit at noon”. Similarly, in “The Painted Door” the snowstorm became a metaphor for Ann’s inner feelings, her marriage was no longer rosy, all that chaos was like a snowstorm reappearing. Both stories have similarities when Ellen looks far away at the desolate, windy, dusty landscape outside as if looking inside, filled with thoughts of struggle with the harsh life in the …show more content…
In “The Lamp at Noon” Paul does not accept leaving the farm because he wants to achieve material success, he does not accept leaving everything behind to start a new life despite the current situation at the lack of any progress, it is like an obsession that reflects a man’s deep fear of failure. For Ellen, staying on the farm, isolated and buried in dirt, made her stressed as she thought about her desires and future for her children, further aggravating her marriage, pushing them to the brink of despair. Ann’s infidelity in “The Painted Door” can be understood as an attempt to find hope for the marriage life she once dreamed of, an attempt to escape this suffocating marriage because of the lack of love. The connection in her communication with John reflects the emotional distance created by the harsh winter conditions. When environmental circumstances become harsh, it explodes as a catalyst, causing people’s inner emotions to become even more chaotic. This has been proven through psychoanalytic research, which shows that human psychological motivations and behaviors come from the
The story is taking place in a prairie. The first line of pg. 47 declares that. The same page is talking about a storm might be coming. I guess, there is a ocean near the prairie. On pg. 48, I found that the prairie landscape is discomforting due to the fact that it seems alive. It also talks about the farmsteads are there to intensify the situation. That same page talking about putting fire. It is taking place during winter, and may be somewhere during December. I think, the time is during the Great Depression of 1930's. In pg. 51 we found that John's farm is under mortgage. The same page tells, He works hard too much to earn some dollars. From pg. 52, I also found, he does not appoint any helper. In pg. 52, Ann remembers about their good time as well. Now, they are not having that of a easy life. They are tired by the labour. These all quotations proves that, the setting of the story is in a hill during the great depression of 1930's.
"The Painted Door" by Sinclair Ross centers on a woman who finds herself unhappy living on the farm far away from any companionship. The story takes place in the early part of the 20th century in a rather desolate farming area in Canada during the most bitter part of the winter. In fact, during the story, a terrible blizzard breaks which becomes a major part of the story.
“Even the distant farmsteads she could see served only to intensify a sense of isolation” (Door, 48).
In the beginning of the story, John has to go see his father who lives five miles away and help him as there is a blizzard expected. Since the snow was too deep, he had to walk over to his father's house due to the wagon would not be able to go through all the snow. Ann never being alone, argues that surely she is more important than John's father by saying, “[..]Surely I'm as important as your father.” This later end with her failure to remain loyal due to the fact that she starts comparing her own husband qualities to the qualities of Steven making her to be unfaithful to John who later sees Ann and Steven together. This was all a result to Steven’s ambitions to undermine Ann’s loyalty to John. But as the story continue we see that Ann remains loyal by keeping positive and also fully aware that John will always return home for her. So keeping this thought in mind, she keeps to a routine and decides to paint the bedroom door knowing that it's too cold for the paint to stay on the door. However, she keeps repeating, “'I'm a fool” leading to understand the frustration and the hate for living a life that includes so much
Goodness verses evil is how most novels portray light verses dark. Marilynne Robinson challenges this idea in her novel Housekeeping by changing the roles of light and dark. Light, in her novel, represents a normal life as Lucille, the protagonist’s sister, chooses to endorse. Darkness is portrayed as a source of enlightenment and a path to an abnormal life which Ruth, the protagonist, and Sylvie, the protagonist’s aunt, embrace. In the novel Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson, the main characters, Ruth and Lucille, have to choose their lifestyle as a normal one in the light, or one that is unique in the dark.
In the short story, “The Painted Door”, John and Ann are a married couple, who have been together for seven years, and yet despite this fact, they still have trouble communicating. Ann wishes, from the very beginning of the story, that John would stay at home with her rather than go to check on his father. However, rather than expressing these sentiments exactly, she acts very cold towards him and insists that she’ll be perfectly fine, trying to guilt him into staying. Though it works, as John offers to stay with her rather than visiting his father’s farm, Ann decides to instead push away her feelings of spite and loneliness and allows him to leave, despite worrying about his safety and how she’s going to cope while John is gone. This is the
Sinclair Ross uses vivid imagery of nature to reflect and influence the emotions of his characters in his short story The Lamp at Noon. The wind is a powerful force that changes with the emotions of Ellen and Paul. Sinclair describes the wind as two separate winds: "the wind in flight, and the wind that pursue[s]" (Atwood/Weaver, 74). Like the wind in flight which cannot escape the wind that pursues it, Ellen cannot escape her isolation. The wind in flight always returns to "quake among the feeble eaves, as if in all this dust-mad wilderness it knew no other sanctuary" (74). Ellen is also forced to seek refuge within her small home, which is also the place where she feels the most secluded. The wind outside often contrasts the silence that is encased inside. During an argument between Paul and Ellen, there is an uncomfortable silence, "a deep fastness of it enclosed by rushing wind and creaking walls"(76). This noise around them makes the silence within even more uncomfortable. Paul later finds the silence comforting when he is in the stable. It is described as a "deep hollow calm within, a vast darkness engulfed beneath the tides of moaning wind" (78). The silence protects him and brings him relief from the dangerous world outside. Unfortunately, the walls seem to weaken against the powerful wind, and "instead of release or escape from the assaulting wind, the walls [are] but a feeble stand against it" (78). Paul begins to understand what Ellen is feeling, and the wind screams like Ellen's cries. As he thinks of ways to restore the land and make Ellen happy, the wind starts to slacken. For a short moment, he feels relief. When he returns to the house, he realizes that Ellen is gone. At this point, the wind whimpers and moans as if it knows Ellen's isolation and Paul's despair. The imagery of the wind is used by Sinclair to intensify the characters' emotions and help the reader understand what the characters are experiencing.
The dilemmas, developed from the motivation, compel the characters to resolve their conflicts. In "The Painted Door", Ann is struggling in a violent tumult of mental and emotional anguish and trying to find importance in life. The conflict arises in her decision to gratify one of two goals; immediate satisfaction, sleeping with Steven, or long term satisfaction, the love and support of her faithful dependable husband. Ann also faces a conflict between a social need and an emotional need. Initially with John she feels she can't connect to society because "John never talks [He] never danced or enjoyed himself" (Ross 160-162), however after sleeping with Steven her guilt leads her to realize that "John is the man with him lay all the future" (174) and only with him can she be completely and emotionally fulfilled.
“The Lamp at Noon” written by Sinclair Ross, it is about a couple who lives at the dusty and windy prairies during the Great Depression. The drought & the dust storm has taken has taken the couples happiness and changed their life. The other story by Sinclair Ross, “The Painted Door” is very similar to “The Lamp at Noon”, a couple living up on the mountains experiences a very severe snow storm, this causing the conflict on the couple due to feel of isolation. Setting is a crucial element to establish a conflict that could change the characters action, thoughts and words. “The Lamp at Noon” and “The Painted Door” is one of the greatest examples of them, if Ross used the settings that was not harsh these conflict would have never occurred. Sinclair Ross portray the psychological landscapes of his characters by mirroring location, time and weather with the characteristics of the characters.
The novel Through Black Spruce is an incredible book that shows the real truth and real life scenario of the First Nation community across Canada, it shows the real hardship and struggles the community faces every day and how they overcome it. The presence of the symbolism does give the novel a whole new meaning to it, the symbolism of beaver representing family and how they stick together, this shows Will bird a bush pilot in the novel, his struggles. The symbol of a bear portrays protection and love, proving once again the hardships the characters face throughout the novel and seeking for protection. While the symbol of Gosse represents seeking freedom, taking on a long journey, and seeking someone is what both of the main characters in the novel try to do. In the novel Through Black Spruce by Joseph Boyden, reveals to the reader that symbolism is a self-reflection of the character’s struggles’ and culture which helps the reader understand their own way of living.
Ann and John, two characters from he short story "The Painted Door", do not have a very healthy relationship. John is a simple farmer who thinks the only way he can please his wife, Ann, is by working all day to earn money for her. However Ann would prefer him to spend more time with her. Their relationship is stressed even further when Ann is left at home alone with nothing to think about but their relationship because John has to go to his father’s house. The terrible snowstorm accentuates Ann’s feelings of loneliness and despair. John does not pay enough attention to Ann, and therefore creates a weak relationship.
Duong Thu Huong’s novel, ‘Paradise of the Blind’ creates a reflective, often bittersweet atmosphere through the narrator Hang’s expressive descriptions of the landscapes she remembers through her life. Huong’s protagonist emphasises the emotional effects these landscapes have on her, acknowledging, “many landscapes have left their mark on me.”
“Into The Wild” by John Krakauer is a non-fiction biographical novel which is based on the life of a young man, Christopher McCandless. Many readers view Christopher’s journey as an escape from his family and his old life. The setting of a book often has a significant impact on the story itself. The various settings in the book contribute to the main characters’ actions and to the theme as a whole. This can be proven by examining the impact the setting has on the theme of young manhood, the theme of survival and the theme of independent happiness.
From its beginning, the literature of the 1960s valued man having a close relationship with nature. Jack Kerouac shows us the ideal form of this relationship in the story of Han Shan, the Chinese poet. At first, these concerns appear to have little relevance to Goodbye, Columbus by Philip Roth. However, by mentioning Gauguin, Roth gives us a view of man's ideal relationship to nature very similar to the one seen in the story of Han Shan. The stories of Han Shan and Gauguin offer an interesting commentary Neil and Brenda's relationship, as well as insight into its collapse.
Women have traditionally been known as the less dominant sex. Through history women have fought for equal rights and freedom. They have been stereotyped as being housewives, and bearers of children. Only with the push of the Equal Rights Amendment have women had a strong hold on the workplace alongside men. Many interesting characters in literature are conceived from the tension women have faced with men. This tension comes from men, society, in general, and within a woman herself. Two interesting short stories, “The Yellow Wall-paper" and “The Story of an Hour," focus on a woman’s fix near the turn of the 19th century. This era is especially interesting