In my opinion the author use the literary device of foreshadowing extremely well. He uses it to do exactly what's in the name-foreshadow, or indicate that something important will occur in the future. He usually does this at the end of a chapter or after something positive happens. For example:
"Fifteen minutes of dicey, fatigue crampon work brought me safely to the bottom of the incline, where I easily located my pack, and another ten minutes after that I was in camp myself . I lunged into my tent with my crampons still on, zipped the door tight, and sprawled across the frost-covered floor too tired to even sit upright. For the first tor time I had a sense of how wasted I really was: I was more exhausted than I'd ever been in my life. But I was safe. Andy was safe. The others would be coming into camp soon. We'd fucking done it. We'd climbed Everest. It had been a little sketchy there for a while, but in the end everything had turned out great.
It would be many hours before I learned that everything had not in fact turned great-that nineteen men and women were stranded up on the mountain by the storm, caught in a desperate struggle for their lives."
I would use foreshadowing in my own writing probably the same way that Jon Krakauer did. I would use it to signal that in the future something interesting would happen and that there would be a turn of events. I don't think that I would use foreshadowing much because I would like there to be an element surprise. When I would use it though, I would make it really subtle instead of outright saying that "things would change" because in my opinion that would make things much more interesting.
I really agree with the statement you said about how he uses literary devices. We defiantly talk about those a lot on Tuesdays. It's like he's describing every scene likes he's there right as he was writing it. Really good job on noticing the foreshadowing he used. I like how you noticed how he was pretty direct when foreshadowing. It wasn't that low-key. it was like BAM! Those were maybe not some of the best parts of the book. He was almost TOO direct.
ReplyDeleteI think this is great, I love the quote, how dramatic even just a paragraph or two is, I love the use of description and just how clear an image it draws. I agree with you in that I wouldn't use foreshadowing very much in my writing, but goodness, if or when I do use it I should hope it is as amazing and dramatic as that. Of course it won't be because if it did I would think I would be somewhere else with my life right now, but its a good goal. Anyway great blog.
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