Wild Geese by Martha Ostenso essays

Wild Geese by Martha Ostenso essays A lot of great Canadian authors base their books on the prairie or land and its inhabitants. Wild Geese by Martha Ostenso is a wonderful example of this. Throughout the novel, many references are made to natural elements and also animals. Three very noticeable references could be picked out. These references were made to Judith, who is seen as a wild horse, to the wild geese that always move to new places, and also to the weather and how the family's attitudes and emotions, especially Caleb's, are changed by it. Wild Geese are talked about quite frequently throughout this novel. There are many references to people who are compared to the wild goose, along with what they symbolize. Lind Archer, the schoolteacher, is considered the wild goose for the first while. She came from a large municipality, "to a region beyond human warmth...beyond even human isolation..." (Ostenso, p.34). Mark Jordan is also compared to a wild goose for fundamentally the same reasons as Lind. When he first meets Lind, she thinks that his cry seems to be a, "smote cry upon the heart like the loneliness of the universe..." (Ostenso, p.53). Both Mark and Lind can be compared here, because they are both lonely and isolated. The wild goose symbolizes moving, loneliness, and isolation. Moving is shown when Mark and Lind come from their large municipalities to move up north to a very cold and unfriendly place. Loneliness is shown again through Mark and Lind and how they both miss their life before. They have ver y few friends and are moderately secluded to a very little area. Isolation is also shown by the fact that they are secluded and also that they are in the middle of nowhere with no one within a close distance to talk to. They feel isolated form society because the farms are so spread apart. In the end Mark and Lind move together to go back to the large municipality and wild geese are referred to again. They moved back to where they came f ...