What Is Meant By The Pathetic Fallacy?

This term sounds rather insulting, but in fact it is quite neutral. It's the name given by John Ruskin to a very common tendency – sometimes a deliberate device –by writers and artists to imagine or depict a connection between human emotion and the appearance or behaviour of the landscape. At its simplest, this tendency is so strong that it's found its way into cliché; we say "miserable weather" or "a threatening sky" all the time, as if the weather or environment shared our emotions or was somehow aware of us. In, say, Victorian fiction, a popular scenario involved an errant daughter being thrown out of the family home, her shameful illegitimate baby wrapped in a shawl, and stepping out into heavy rain or, preferably, a snowstorm. Even now, the device often appears in cinema – a quarrel may be mirrored in a sudden thunderstorm, while lovers are usually united in sunny weather.

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