The Memory of Landscape

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Vistas of wonder The memory of landscape “Once in his life a man (or woman) ought to concentrate his mind upon the remembered earth. He ought to give himself up to a particular landscape in his experience; to look at it from as many angles as he can, to wonder upon it, to dwell upon it. He ought to imagine that he touches it with his hands at every season and listen to the sounds that are made upon it. He ought to imagine the creatures there and all the faintest motions of the wind. He ought to recollect the glare of the moon and the colours of the dawn and dusk.“ (Lane, C Belden, Landscapes of the sacred: geography and narrative in American spirituality) Whenever someone tells me about Canada, always first comes to my mind images of wild and untamed territories, beautiful landscapes with big majestic trees, pure peaceful lakes, vivacious rivers, and huge grey mountains. Those images are not personal recollections, since I’ve never been to Canada but I’ve heard so many stories and read so many books that I’ve built my own representation of Canada and committed those landscapes to memory. According to the Webster dictionary a landscape can be described as 1-: a picture representing a view of natural inland scenery 2-: the landforms of a region in the aggregate 3-a portion of territory that can be viewed at one time from one place 4-: a particular area of activity: scene 5-obsolete: vista, prospect If we follow those definitions the landscape appears as something physical, geographical: a limit, a frontier, a mountain or a river. But in effect a landscape can also be understood as something more than just a ‘land’: it can also be understood as a place of practice, or memory, a place with a meaning. This meaning can either be spiritual, artistic, historic or cultural. In
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