Home, Journey and Landscape in Charles Frazier's Cold Mountain: The Mirroring of Internal Processes in the External World and the Literary Construction of Space (Critical Essay‪)‬

Abstract This article examines Charles Frazier's Civil War novel Cold Mountain in the light of postmodern space theory. The basic premise of the paper is that the environment and landscape within the novel consists of a constructed space. This space reflects back (almost as in a mirror) the mental, emotional and psychological states of the two main narrators, Inman and Ada. Another central concept in the paper is that the normal antithesis between home and journey seems at first to be in play here but then becomes less obvious as the novel progresses. In the end, it appears that both characters have been on a journey through unfamiliar landscape, thus adding to the presumption of space that is constructed rather than essential in form.