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Lesley Nelson 971001264

Dan Munteanu
English 104
03 November 2014
The Memory: Death by Landscape
Death by Landscape is a moving short story by Margaret Atwood. The main character
Lois goes through a tragedy early in her life and spends her remaining life focusing, in an almost
obsessive way, to the memory of this tragedy.
At thirteen, Lois and her best friend at camp, Lucy ventured out on a canoe trip that was
led by the counselors at the summer camp they have been attending each summer for years. After
travelling by canoe for two days, the group is deep within the wilderness, thats when Lucy
declares that she has to go to the bathroom. It is 11:45am and the counselors tell Lucy and Lois
that they are cooking lunch today and to be back by noon. The pair takes off to find a tree when
Lucy finds somewhere to go and stops behind a tree at the edge of a cliff. Lois waits for Lucy to
finish and is close enough to hear her but not to see her, when Lois hears a surprised not scared
scream, and Lucy disappears into thin air.
This event troubles Lois her whole life and seems to be the main focus of her depressive
behavior throughout. Lois begins collecting paintings of landscapes as a way to connect with her
childhood friend Lucy. The description of the vivid imagery of the scene when Lucy disappears
is what seems to be the trigger for Loiss memory, for that landscape is what caused the
disappearance of Lucy.
Loiss pictures seem to mean everything to Lois because this is the main focus when she
moves from her house to her apartment. She is glad that there is enough room in her apartment

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for all her pictures. When Lois bought these pictures she wasnt sure what it was about them that
drew her to them but she wanted something in them.
She wanted something that was in them although she could not have said at the time what it
was. It was not peace: She does not find them peaceful in the least. Looking at them fills her with
a wordless unease. (Atwood)
It seems that Lois was drawn to these pictures because of the tragedy she was faced with
at such a young age that has caused this unmistaken hurt and depression all these years later. This
memory causing the possible guilt Lois is feeling for how she acted when Lucy was gone, how
repeats the scenario in her head of the scream. The anger, and sadness of the loss is what has
caged Lois in this world of loneliness. Lois might have regrets of what she could have done
different and not ever knowing what happened to Lucy.
When Lois was married to Rob and had her two boys, it took her focus off of thinking
about Lucy but now they were gone, she is back to the silence that haunts her. An apartment
overlooking Lake Ontario with a beautiful view and Lois chooses to look for Lucy in the
paintings.
While Rob was alive, while the boys were growing up, she could pretend she didn't hear
it, this empty space in sound. But now there is nothing much left to distract her. (Atwood)
The paintings Lois acquires play a significant role in this story because amongst the
artists was once in particular named Tom Thomson. Tom was an influential Canadian artist of
the 20th century who influenced a group of Canadian painters that would eventually be known as
the Group of Seven. Toms death mysteriously took place similarity to Lucys when he
disappeared during a canoeing trip on Canoe Lake. Toms body was discovered in the lake eight

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days later. There was such mystery surrounding Tom Thomsons death that the investigation
continued many years later.
The significance of the title Death by Landscape with an emphasis on the paintings and
vivid imagery of the landscape described leads me to believe that because of this tragedy and the
depression that has followed Lois for all these years is what she may believe that this is what
killed Lucy and the last time Lois felt normal before this psychological obtrusion took over.
The age of the girls when this took place is such a difficult age. There are hormonal
boosts and a social acceptance issue that plague kids minds, this to me, was the breaking point
for Lois. Lois started to notice changes in Lucy, from year to year brought more changes. The
first time Lois met Lucy at camp, Lucy was good-natured and accepted camp and would make
the best of it. This final year at camp was when Lois noticed the biggest changes occur.
THIS year Lucy is different again: slower, more languorous. She is no longer interested
in sneaking around after dark, purloining cigarettes from the counselor, dealing in black market
candy bars. She is pensive, and hard to wake in the mornings. She doesn't like her stepfather, but
she doesn't want to live with her real father either, who has a new wife. She thinks her mother
may be having an affair with a doctor; she doesn't know for sure, but she's seen them smooching
in his car, out in the driveway, when her stepfather wasn't there. It serves him right. She hates her
private school. She has a boyfriend, who is sixteen and works as a gardener's assistant.
(Atwood)
The statement above leads me to believe that Lucy was at that time suffering from her
own depression. Lucys own tragic story of reality and what life was like back home. The
divorce her parents recently went through and her mothers affairs, Lucy didnt want to go back

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home but live in the wilderness away from it all. At Loiss young age and inexperience, she had
no idea what was going on with Lucy but knew that she was different.
Once Lois had reflected upon her life some twenty years later she asked herself Could
she have done it? Done this to Lucy, could she have pushed her off the cliff? Lois felt like
people were always looking at her that way.
This tragic story says more to me about how depression or mental illness can take this
one precious life away from you in the blink of an eye, just how Lucy disappeared.

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Works Cited
Atwood, Margaret. "Death by Landscape." Nortons Anthology of Short Fiction (1990): 24-36.