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TOTW 12/08: What's your take on the detailed nature descriptions in the SS?

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Penthesilea:
What do you make of the detailed nature descriptions in the short story?

At some points, Annie Proulx includes very detailed descriptions of nature in her story. I'll give some examples to show what I'm talking about:

„Dawn came glassy orange, stained from below by a gelatinous band of pale green. The sooty bulk of the mountain paled slowly until it was the same color as the smoke from Enniss's breakfast fire. The cold air sweetened, banded pebbles and crumbs of soil cast sudden pencil-long shadows and the rearing lodgepole pines below them massed in slabs of somber malachite.“
(beginning, their first morning on the mountain)


„ The meadow stones glowed white-green and a flinty wind worked over the meadow, scraped the fire low, then ruffled it into yellow silk ashes.“
(directly before TS1)


„ ...and they packed in the game and moved off the mountain with the sheep, stones rolling at their heels, purple cloud crowding in from the west and the metal smell of coming snow pressing them on. The mountain boiled with demonic energy, glazed with flickering broken-cloud light, the wind combed the grass and drew from the damaged krummholz and slit rock a bestial drone.“
(coming down the mountain)


„ Years on years they worked their way throught the high meadows and mountain drainages, horse-packing into the Big Horns, Medicine Bows, south end of the Gallatins, Absarokas, Granites, Owl Creeks, the Bridger-Teton Range, the Freezeouts and the Shirleys, Ferrises and the Rattlesnakes, Salt River Range into the Wind Rivers over and again, the Sierra Madres, Gros Ventres, the Washakies, Laramies, but never returning to Brokeback.“


„ In May of 1983 ....“
(All of the first paragraphs of their last meeting contain detailed nature description, from the bitter juniper to the tea-colored river to the meadow protected by a stand of lodgepole. Too much to type here)



Do you like these passages?
Do you just read over them without giving them much thought?
Do you think they are dispensable?
Do you think they add to the feel of the story, to its authencity?
Do you enjoy them for their eloquence, their linguistic artistry?
Do you think they have more meaning than what meets the eye at first sight? Meaning do they add to develop the plot?
Other thoughts?


What do you make of the detailed nature descriptions in the short story?

Penthesilea:
Ok, I'll go first this week, to get my point across.

My own take on this aspect of Annie Proulx's story has changed quite a bit over the last two years. The first time I read the story was after I had seen the movie and was totally blown away from it (surprise! ;)). I was intrigued by those characters and their story, and wanted more.

For me the detailed descriptions of nature didn't add to the plot itself (back then), they didn't bring forward the story. An aggravating factor was that English is not my native language and I had to look up the one or other word, especially regarding her nature descriptions. Soon I gave up on doing so and just skimmed through these parts without much interest. I thought they were dispensable.

However, with time I had a closer look at them. I began to like them for their linguistic artistry and since the story is so much a Wyoming story, they add to its authencitiy.

Later even, I asked myself why Annie Proulx had included those details and why. She herself said in interviews, that in a short story every single word has to be right, has to carry meaning, that even the punctuation is important.

With this in mind, I reread the story once again and noticed that these passages seem to correlate with important points of the plot: their first morning together on the mountain (their first time alone);  directly before their first sexual encounter; leaving the mountain; and at the beginning of their last time together.

What is your take on this aspect of the short story?

myprivatejack:
I can't speak very properly about this topic,because I read the s.s. rather after having seen the movie,and in a Spanish translation; so,although global words are the same,surely some descriptions nuances have been lost in translation,what avoided me to catch all the majesty's that Annie wanted us to feel.However,I suppose that all these descriptions surrounding some key moments of their staying on the mountain,are written so as a way of remarking the quality of "Paradise on Earth" that BBM had for them,both physically and emotionally.And the fact that they described the beauty of the landscape when they spent their first time together as a friends,their first sexual encounter and their last moments together-their last on that summer on BBM and their real last time being Jack alive-.All these coincidences,are only a way to heighten this quality of tragic beauty of the mountain,always in contradiction when the real world they were going to find when they came down of it ; that was more tragical in the case of their last encounter,when this real world was going to be their main enemy,their cage,in comparison with their freedom in BBM,their shelter,their Paradise.Yes,for me it could be a symbolism in the majestic description of Brokeback beauty.

Front-Ranger:
Thanks so much for getting us to focus on this delightful subject!

My feeling is that Annie wanted to make comparisons and show similarities between the landscapes and the characters. For instance, in the passage you cited:


--- Quote ---and they packed in the game and moved off the mountain with the sheep, stones rolling at their heels, purple cloud crowding in from the west and the metal smell of coming snow pressing them on. The mountain boiled with demonic energy, glazed with flickering broken-cloud light, the wind combed the grass and drew from the damaged krummholz and slit rock a bestial drone
--- End quote ---

see how she talks about the sheep and then mentions the clouds crowding in...you get an image of the clouds mirroring the sheep. The mountain is pictured similarly to the authoritarian masculine characters of Old Man Twist, Aguirre, or Ennis' dad. The wind is anthropomorphized as a kind of shepherd of the earth, combing the grass and eliciting beastly moans.

Annie Proulx has mentioned how she has studied artists and one of them, Charles Russell, often painted a scene of men, horses, and livestock in their earthly struggles mirrored by the sky and clouds above. Ang Lee also took his cue from AP, and included scenery throughout the movie such as a shot of two clouds at sunset, one dark blue and one orange. Obviously they are meant to stand for Jack and Ennis.

brokeplex:
Dawn came glassy orange, stained from below by a gelatinous band of pale green. The sooty bulk of the mountain paled slowly until it was the same color as the smoke from Enniss's breakfast fire. The cold air sweetened, banded pebbles and crumbs of soil cast sudden pencil-long shadows and the rearing lodgepole pines below them massed in slabs of somber malachite.“

my fav quotation from the ss.

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