Gr 4 Up A fine example of a 20th-Century regional ballad, one that tells of the profound cold of the Yukon and how it affected the lives of two gold miners. If no . . . Ancient Mariner in philosophic potential or length, nevertheless it is similar in its ability to create moods of danger, death, and mystic liberation. Harrison's paintings are also mood-producing in their expressionistic use of flat, saturated colors that seem trapped by thick lines of contrasting colors to create shapes of people, landscape, and sky. Heavy use of blues and purples allows the occasional bright red of a parka or orange sunrise to emphasize the bitterness of the incessant cold. The atmosphere is dry and crystal clear, so that distances shrink, and the encapsulated shapes of clouds, mountains, and frozen rivers and lakes create a world without movement or end, the eternal frost that Sam could no longer tolerate. An added feature in this version are brief captions printed at the bottom of each text page, opposite the full-page paintings, that explain a little of the picture's content. Service's ballad, written in 1907, and Harrison's paintings are strong evocations of the Gold Rush era in the Yukon. Kenneth Marantz, Art Education Department, Ohio State University, Columbus
