Härliga hagar och skrämmande skogar : om våra känslor för landskapet och vad de beror på

Sammanfattning: Do our imaginations of real landscapes get affected by works of art such as paintings, myths and literature? They often give very colourful descriptions in words as well as pictures. Do they actually change our feelings for the landscapes we are in and carry around as images inside? Close your eyes and take a few deep breaths. Imagine that you are leaning against a wooden fence a mild summer evening. The green grass is growing high around your feet, to hard to get for the two horses that slowly stroll around a bit further away in the meadow while they wave their long tales. It's quiet and calm, there's a whisper from the trees and a bird is singing its lonely song, but it doesn't disturb the silence. How do you feel? Close your eyes again but this time, pretend that you're leaning against a high spruce. The spruce is only one among many in the deep forest that you've walked far into. Moss grows on the branches, at times so rich that it looks as if the trees have got beards. The sunlight is struggling to reach for the ground but the dense spruces are giving it a hard time. An owl hoots and the sound seems to spread into the deep. How do you feel now? Which circumstances affect how one feels for different landscapes while thinking on them or walking around in them? Is it all inborn or do we get imprinted by different factors, where the earlier mentioned works of art could be one? This is being discussed in this paper, Delightful meadows and frightening forests. Is the meadow delightful and is the forest frightening? Are there general opinions about different landscapes and where, in that case, do they come from? The starting point for this paper is the fairy tale, whose images of our surroundings we early in life get involved with. What part do they play? I've taken me on the questions, using literature studies, a questionnaire and my own thoughts as tools.