Traditional Lit Analysis Seasons Change: Essay

Total Length: 991 words ( 3 double-spaced pages)

Total Sources: 1

Page 1 of 3

"The rain, of course. It came midway though the third day, clouds the color of iron filings, the lake hammered to iron too, and the storm that crashed through the trees and beat at their tent with a thousand angry fists (p.4)." This quotation is all the more salient for the fact that in the subsequent paragraph the author mentions that the lovers have neglected to bring sufficient protection. The imagery of the angry fists and the grey storm ravaging trees foreshadows the consequences of such neglect.

Boyle employs a similar sense of foreboding by utilizing imagery inherent in Winter to foreshadow the trouble which the will beset upon the characters when China gives birth. Although the setting is in mid-December, the following quotation, in which China is going to meet Jeremy at a hotel to give birth and then destroy her child, is definitely like Winter in tone and feel, largely due to the imagery used in it. "By eight, the rain had turned to ice and every branch of every tree was coated with it, the highway littered with glistening black sticks, no moon, no stars, the tires sliding out from under her…(p.6)." Literally, Winter is the time of year typified by cold, a lack of life, and the death of natural things such as flowers, trees, and other such verdure. The images of ice covered trees and a sky besotted with clouds obscuring stars and celestial objects certainly reinforces this notion.

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Yet on the figurative level, this imagery is being used to allude to the death of the characters -- the death of the life which China is about to bear, and a similar death to the love, hope, and future they had planned together, all of which is brought to an end by their ensuing arrest, imprisonment, and China's alleged testimony against Jeremy. Boyle foreshadows all of these different factors by utilizing elements of nature, much as he uses them throughout the duration of the story.

In conclusion, the author of "The Love Of My Life" employs a variety of imagery pertinent to nature, specifically to the seasons of Spring and Winter, to foreshadow the bulk of the major events which take place in this short story. The imagery used magnifies the levity and austerity of the facets of the plot which the characters endure. The life of nature and its death, as well as the life which the character's bear and the death of that life, can all be seen in the imagery of these different seasons. One of the essential elements in a Greek tragedy, of course, is death, and to that end, Boyle's work certainly classifies as one. Whether or not China does actually testify against Jeremy at the story's conclusion, however, may be alluded to by the fact that she still regards him as her love......

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"Traditional Lit Analysis Seasons Change " (2011, August 03) Retrieved May 22, 2025, from
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"Traditional Lit Analysis Seasons Change ", 03 August 2011, Accessed.22 May. 2025,
https://www.aceyourpaper.com/essays/traditional-lit-analysis-seasons-change-43756