Landscapes

Landscapes: “The Mountain That Was God”
"Some names are old and original in the mind, like the beat of the rain on the river" - Scott Momaday (Landscapes, p 94)

"In a world shorn of magic, they still carry power"-Lane

In Landscapes, the significance of Mount Rainier is more fully realized by Lane having acknowledged its original moniker- Tahoma, dubbed as such by Native Americans of the Pacific Northwest.
Lane describes the encounter with the mountain as profoundly and inescapably sacred, from the analogy of tree branches as the Trinity to the sacred silence of slow growth in the forest.
Names can enhance the historical context of the place, but names, can also be masks. Through a mask a place can go from ordinary to extraordinary. Perhaps some of the associations we have with a name can make us appreciate it or show disdain for it at its mention. My immediate thought is for the Big Apple, New York City: the concrete jungle “where dreams are made of” as one song tells. It’s busy streets and Broadway central fill the mind with grand aspirations and a mental picture of yellow taxis, endless floods of people, and opportunity everywhere.
This is a mask where the ordinary: New York, New York is made extraordinary. On the other hand, the mention of its counterpart and neighbor, New Jersey, and a completely different mental image is summoned. One of a letdown, a rival, a lesser-than place with the leftovers from the main event called New York. Here the mask shows an extraordinary place made ordinary in light of its tourist hotspot competitor.




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