When curled up with a good book, do you remember being
transported to the moors of northern England, to the red roads of
Georgia, or to dear little Prince Edward Island? The importance of
place in a novel, or story, can sometimes be tantamount to the telling
of the tale. Take Scarlet out of the old south and what do you have?
Take Heathcliff out of the moors and who is he?
A sense
of place puts the reader in the story, puts the character up against
something- whether it is a harsh environment they are grappling with,
or a cultural imperative which leaves them feeling as though the deck is stacked against them.
What are the underlying layers of the place your character's inhabit?
What are the threats? Did the place start as a swamp, or a thriving
port? Did they have to beat back the forest, or are the bushes full
of snakes? Who came there first? Was it miners, or homesteaders? Who was
indigenous? What was the climate?
Do you remember those green
felt boards kindergarten teachers used to use as props? Remember how
they would stick felt things on to the green board to teach us how to
count ducks, or whatever. The setting of a novel is kind of like the
green felt and the characters are then the ducks.
These are
details that can make or break a story.
By taking a look at the
great ones, we can gain many tips, as we set out to describe the
places where our characters live and the role that place plays in
the story.
It occurred to me that I
actually love place driven stories. While a place can never be the
whole story, it can be a huge part of shaping the action of a story.
There is nothing that defines a writer more completely than the
concept of really honing in on the character of his home town, or
region, and then becoming synonymous with that place. Consider Margret
Mitchell with Atlanta, James Joyce with Dublin, the Brontes with the
moors and Pat Conroy with South Carolina and then my perennial and
personal favorite and the best selling book of all time, L.M. Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables and Prince Edward
Island.
Other writers may not be
from a region, but can go there and define it nevertheless. Take
James Mitchner with Hawaii and the middle east, Leon Uris with
Londonderry in Northern Ireland, Passage to India's, E. M Forester
and then of course, Shakespeare himself. The place will shape the
lives of the characters as they adapt to changes through time.
Here are some pages from the
opening chapters of Anne of Green Gables:
“They had driven over the
crest of a hill. Below them was a pond, looking almost like a river
so long and winding was it. A bridge spanned it midway and from there
to its lower end, were an amber hued belt of sand-hills shut it in
from the dark blue gulf beyond, the water was a glory of many
shifting hues- the most spiritual shadings of of crocus and rose and
ethereal green, with other elusive tintings for which no name has
ever been found. Above the bridge the pond ran up into fringing
groves of fir and maple and lay all darkly translucent in their
wavering shadows. Here and there a wild plum leaned out from the bank
like a white-clad girl tip-toeing to her own reflection. From the
marsh at the head of the pond came the clear, mournfully- sweet
chorus of frogs. There was a little gray house peering around a white
apple orchard on a slope beyond and, although it was not yet quite
dark, a light was shining from one of its windows.
“That's Barry's pond, “
said Mathew.
“Oh, I don't like that
name, either. I shall call it- let me see- the Lake of Shining
Waters. Yes, that's the right name for it. I know because it gives me
a thrill. Do things ever give you a thrill?"
When they had driven up
the further hill and around a corner Mathew said, "We're pretty
near home now. That's Green Gables over-”
“Oh don't tell me,” she
interrupted breathlessly, catching at his partially raised arm and
shutting her eyes that she might not see his gesture. “Let me
guess. I'm sure I'll guess right.”
She opened her eyes and
looked about her. They were on the crest of a hill. The sun has set
some time since, the the landscape was still clear in the mellow
after-light. To the west a dark church spire rose up against a
marigold sky. Below was a little valley and beyond a long,
gently-rising slope with snug farmsteads scattered along it. From one
to another the child's eyes darted, eager and wistful. At last they
lingered on one away to the left, far back from the road, dimly white
with blossoming trees in the twilight of the surrounding woods. Over
it the stainless southwest sky, a great crystal white star was
shining like a lamp of guidance and promise.
“That's it, isn't it?”
she said pointing.
****
It was broad daylight when
Anne awoke and sat up in bed, staring confusedly at the window
through which a flood of cheery sunshine was pouring and outside of
which something white and feather waved across the glimpses of blue
sky.
For a moment she could not
remember where she was. First came a delightful thrill, as if
something very pleasant: then a horrible remembrance. This was Green
Gables and they didn't want her because she wasn't a boy!
But it was morning and,
yest it was a cherry tree in full bloom outside of her window With a
bound she was out of bed and across the floor. She pushed up the
sash- it went up stiffly and creakily, as if it hadn't been opened
for a long time, which was the case; and it stuck so tight that
nothing was needed to hold it up.
Anne dropped on her knees
and gazed out into the June morning her eyes glistening with delight.
Oh, wasn't it beautiful? Wasn't it a lovely place? Suppose she wasn't
really going to stay here! She would imagine she was. There was scope
for the imagination here.
A huge cherry-tree grew
outside, so close that its boughs tapped against the house, and it
was so thick- set with blossoms that hardly a leaf was to be seen. On
both sides of the house was a big orchard, one of apple-trees and one
of cherry-trees, also showered with blossoms; and their grass was all
sprinkled over with dandelions. In the garden below were lilac-trees
purple with flowers, and their dizzily sweet fragrance drifted up to
the window on the morning wind.
Below the garden a green
field lush with clover sloped down to the hollow where the brook ran
and were scores of white birches grew, springing airily out of and
undergrowth suggestive of delightful possibilities in ferns and
mosses and woodsy things generally. Beyond it was a a hill, green and
feathery with spruce and fir; there was a gap in it where the gray
gable end of the little house she had seen from the other side of the
Lake of Shining Waters was visible.
Off to the left were the
big barns and beyond them, away down, over the green, low sloping
fields, was a sparkling blue glimpse of sea.
Anne's beauty -loving eyes
lingered on it all, taking everything greedily in; she has looked on
so many unlovely places in her life, poor child; but this was as
lovely as anything she had ever dreamed.
She knelt there, lost to
everything, but the loveliness around her, until she was startled by
the hand on her shoulder. Marilla had come in unheard by the small
dreamer.
"It's time you were dressed," she said curtly."
So the stage is set. We are caught up in the drama of Anne's situation, and we want her to be able to stay at Green Gables because we know how much she has fallen in love with the place. This rapture has drawn thousands upon thousands of tourists to Prince Edward Island ever since the book was published. The powerful description not only puts us in this place, but makes us want to go and see it for ourselves. I doubt there is a writer, living or deceased, who has ever captured the beauty of a place better than L.M. Montgomery.
Breaking news: We have just learned that Anne of Green Gables is slated for the silver screen.
