A Land Remembered By Patrick D. Smith: Character Analysis

Throughout the novel “A Land Remembered” by Patrick D. Smith we exhibit a constant struggle of man vs. nature. We see theses struggles when Tobias MacIvey moves his family to Florida. Once they arrived they fight to survive in such a harsh environment. They learn to survive off the land. As time continues on, the MacIvey family expands two more generations. It is through these generations that there is a change in how people interact with the land. What was once people living off the land to them abusing it. In the beginning of the novel, we are introduced to Tobias. He does his best to learn from the land. For the longest time the family was surviving on Raccoons and Squirrels because they were the only animals they could find. Eventually, Tobias makes a living off herding cows and orange groves. He uses the …show more content…
’It is all gone, Sol, just as Lake Okeechobee as we once knew it is gone, and the custard-apple forest is gone, and the balk cypress trees are gone. You are trying to capture the fog, and no one can do that” (p. 6). This is something I have personally come to know. I have had the opportunity to live in the same house since I was an infant. With that said, I have seen a major transformation in my surroundings. For example, there used to be only two houses on my street back in 1995, now there are more than thirty houses on the same street. Buildings continue to go up, left and right, as this continues the land begins to diminish. As time evolves, we as people seem to focus more on the idea of how much money can a piece of land make us. As result, buildings continue to be constructed. Meanwhile, there are abandoned buildings just around the corner. We as humans are consuming this land. If we continue this lifestyle we will have nothing left. Without the land, we have no life and neither do the other creatures that live among