English A30
Essay
Sumeet Choksi
Mr. Armstrong
English 30A
November 17, 2002.
The Lonely Land
In "The Lonely Land," Arthur James Marshall Smith captures the aggressive character of the country, Canada. He portrays the desolate and austere beauty of the country in which he spent the most impressionable years of his youth, by using few techniques to illustrate imagery.
In the first Canto, Smith creates an environment that depicts the nature of this land and shows what an external form of beauty does to it. For example, "Cedar and jagged fir uplift barbs against the gray and cloud-piled sky." These lines tell the reader that Smith has set the scene where there are firs, fish and a gray cloudy sky that is heavy with rain. The next few lines "and in the bay blown spume and windrift and thin, bitter spray snap at the whirling sky; and the pine trees lean one way." These lines reveal that it is about to rain and there is froth forming at bay with strong winds blowing sprigs of flowers at bay and causing the pine trees to sway from one side to the other. Smith uses techniques such as diction, repetition and personification to describe what he has written about and gives us a clear picture of the scene. Repetition is used with the word "and" as it is used five times in this stanza and personification for example, is used in the line "thin, bitter spray." The words thin and bitter can only describe a human and not an inanimate object such as a flower.
Essay
Sumeet Choksi
Mr. Armstrong
English 30A
November 17, 2002.
The Lonely Land
In "The Lonely Land," Arthur James Marshall Smith captures the aggressive character of the country, Canada. He portrays the desolate and austere beauty of the country in which he spent the most impressionable years of his youth, by using few techniques to illustrate imagery.
In the first Canto, Smith creates an environment that depicts the nature of this land and shows what an external form of beauty does to it. For example, "Cedar and jagged fir uplift barbs against the gray and cloud-piled sky." These lines tell the reader that Smith has set the scene where there are firs, fish and a gray cloudy sky that is heavy with rain. The next few lines "and in the bay blown spume and windrift and thin, bitter spray snap at the whirling sky; and the pine trees lean one way." These lines reveal that it is about to rain and there is froth forming at bay with strong winds blowing sprigs of flowers at bay and causing the pine trees to sway from one side to the other. Smith uses techniques such as diction, repetition and personification to describe what he has written about and gives us a clear picture of the scene. Repetition is used with the word "and" as it is used five times in this stanza and personification for example, is used in the line "thin, bitter spray." The words thin and bitter can only describe a human and not an inanimate object such as a flower.
