Loss In Margaret Atwood's Death By Landscape

Summer camp is the place most associate with their childhood. The crackle of firewood, the faint smell of sunscreen and the harsh glare of the bright sun on a flat lake almost subconsciously whisk one away to a time when they felt sheltered and happy. Summer camp is a child’s safe place. Therefore what happens to a person when they lose this place and the beloved memories which accompany it? When loss ruins a safe haven, trauma follows. The idea of loss is especially damaging to children, as childhood is a time when one is accustomed to simply receiving. In Margaret Atwood’s Death by Landscape, Atwood demonstrates the lasting results of traumatic loss during childhood, through the protagonist, Lois’s, sudden shift in identity, self-inflicted …show more content…
The heart of a child is wide-open and ready to love. Children have not yet learned that they can be scorned by love and have no coping strategies in place if this actually does happen. Every summer, Lois looked forward to reuniting and catching up with her best friend. Every summer, Lois could count on seeing the person who made her feel such joy and excitement. Until, one summer, that person is suddenly gone. After experiencing such a shocking loss at a young age, Lois copes by developing a defense mechanism to ensure she doesn’t ever feel loss so deeply again. In Lois’s mind, the most effective way to prevent herself from feeling hurt after losing someone she cares about, is to prevent herself from truly caring about others. When Lois cannot find Lucy after she hears Lucy’s startled scream, she states that “she felt terrible, guilty and dismayed as if she had done something very bad, by mistake; something that could never be repaired” (52). Atwood establishes that what Lois feels can never be repaired is her ability to love as wholeheartedly as she once had. As she ages, Lois may not have physically isolated herself but emotionally; she is miles away from her family. Atwood writes that Lois “never felt she was paying full attention. She was tired a lot, as if she was living not one but two; her own, and another shadowy life that hovered around her” …show more content…
The thing a person can take solace in after the death of a loved one is closure, but for Lois, there was no closure after Lucy’s death. With no knowledge about what really transpired that fateful day in the forest and no one but herself to blame, Lois lives life half-expecting Lucy to appear one day. Lois will never be able to understand what happened to her best friend and consequently can’t let go of the tragedy because in her mind, it isn’t over. Therefore, Lois looks to the place where the disappearance occurred for answers. She purchases paintings, which remind her of Lookout Point, she lost Lucy, but they do not help her process her loss. Atwood writes that Lois “wanted something that was in them; although she could not have said at the time what it was. It was not peace” (48). Lois does not find the paintings “peaceful” because she feels as though there is “something or someone, looking back out” (48). Lois has created a reality where Lucy is alive and simply hiding in the paintings to find peace. Lois developed a defense mechanism to cope with Lucy’s death by deluding herself into believing that with her purchase of these landscape paintings, Lois was also purchasing piece of mind. Atwood indicates that Lois cannot comprehend how a young girl could simply disappear when she writes that Lois thinks, “because she is nowhere definite, she could be anywhere” (53).

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