Brokeback Mountain: Our Community's Common Bond > Brokeback Mountain Open Forum

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

<< < (4/7) > >>

BlissC:

--- Quote from: Vermont Sunset on April 11, 2008, 08:03:13 am ---AP is truly a genius.

--- End quote ---

Indeed she is.

Interesting observation on the insect and the tablecloth metaphor too. I'd never paid that much attention to that line before, but now you've pointed it out, yep, it is kind of unsettling and almost at odds with the nature descriptions.

brokeplex:

--- Quote from: Vermont Sunset on April 11, 2008, 02:48:53 pm ---Contrast Jack's view of Ennis. "night fire." "a red spark on the huge black mass of mountain." No ambiguity there, huh? Ennis is Jack's true love and only joy in a dark and forboding world.


--- End quote ---

excellent observation!  I did not "see" that visual metaphor before!  :)

Brown Eyes:

I think Annie's writing is particularly strong/poignant/complex in the moments where she's describing natural elements.  Absolutely beautiful and really inspiring.  Her sometimes quirk or unexpected "turns of phrase" and knack at description are some of my favorite elements of her style.

In terms of significance, I think it's so important to recognize how the lovely descriptions not only stand alone as bits of writing, but the metaphors and descriptions in those nature passages also inform the story about the human characters and give us insight into things like mood, foreboding, emotion, etc. that don't always come across purely from dialogue or explanation of things going on at the human level.

Annie's close attention to natural detail seems to be a big clue to us in terms of watching the film... that visual clues and elements of nature that we are presented with in the cinematic version of the story must also carry profound meaning.  Way beyond simply being pretty scenery.

Her attention to natural elements leads us to those wonderful discussions about natural phenomenons like wind, fire, earth and snow.  And, clearly this all informs the film's tag line "love is a force of nature."  Almost nudging the reader/viewer to take those details of nature very seriously.

THE WINGS:
I feel that Annie's detailed descriptions of the natural settings of the story are truly brilliant, beyond what words can accurately describe. She paints a picture, so vivid, and visceral, that you can almost smell and feel the "hard-scrabble" existence dictated by the rugged, "masculine" landscape that Jack and Ennis grew up in.  In all of her stories, (That Old Ace In the Hole) which I am currently reading is no exception.  You get to literally breathe the air and feel the the landscape that these characters inhabit, which gives her stories the verisimilitude that makes them so REAL and believable, AND which most of us can relate to, on many different levels.

This makes her one of my all-time favourite authors, without a doubt.

Enough said....

THE WINGS

Penthesilea:
Thanks everybody for sharing your insights  :).

"The mountain boiled with demonic engery..." - this part always makes me feel like the mountain itself wanted to buck them off, like it were a living and breathing thing. I get a picture in my head of a moving, wobbling mass of mountain, like a bucking horse (or bull) in slow-motion.



One part I haven't made much sense of yet is the listing of all the mountain ranges they went to over the years. Of course it's striking that they were all over the place - but never returned to Brokeback. The garden Eden metaphor we discussed several times before. Once you're thrown out, you can never return. Hey, even the movie trailer says so "There are places we can't return".

But to make this point, it would have been enough if Proulx had listed three or four mountain ranges, adding .."and many others" (something along that lines). But she doesn't. Instead she lists no less than seventeen (!*) different mountain ranges.
Any thoughts on this?


*There's that number again; we discussed the 17 before, but mostly movie related. Could it be another example of the Lee/Proulx/Ossana/Murtry synergy?

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page