In the excerpt from "Annabel", landscape is used to enhance character and theme quite noticeably. Labrador’s coast is a particularly scenic part of North America and “a traveler can come to Labrador and feel its magnetic energy or not feel it.” The land has a strong connection with its inhabitants, but also select tourists. Jacinta and Treadway are described using scenery in the following quotation: “Treadway belonged to Labrador but Jacinta did not.” Treadway has followed in his father’s footsteps and worked as a trapper while Jacinta teaches in the little school in Croydon Harbour. The land is important to Treadway and his fellow trappers and it is described with great respect in the excerpt. “Canadian mapmakers had named the lake but the people who inhabited the Labrador interior had given it a different name, a name that remains a secret.” Treadway feels a strong connection to the landscape and this is made clear to the reader as the excerpt continues. Treadway “considered the house to belong to his wife, while the place where waters changed direction belonged to him, and would belong to any son he had.”
The landscape is beautifully described in this excerpt. At times, it comes alive and a clear image is created in the reader’s mind. The following quotation shows the respect and strong relationship with the land the trappers possess: “The movements of the ducks were the white hunter’s calligraphy.” Nature plays a prominent part of these trapper’s lives and the descriptive landscape in this excerpt makes this apparent.
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