Examples of Topographic Description

Topographic Description

The topographic description is a rhetorical or expressive figure which consists of describing a specific space or place.

It is a resource widely used in all types of texts in which it is important for the reader to get an idea of ​​the environment in which the actions occur. We can find topographic descriptions in texts exhibition, narratives, Chronicles or travel diaries.

Like all descriptions, topographical ones can be objective (when they focus on describing the concrete and verifiable characteristics of a space) or subjective (when the particular sensations of the issuer with respect to the place described are transmitted).

Characteristics of the topographic description

Examples of topographic description

1. About a garden

At the back of the garage the garden peeked out like lightning. It began with short, soft grass, amethyst green, swooping over concrete around as if wanting to flee in terror, as if waiting to be pulled from the black and damp earth of area. At once the almost gray trunks of the apple and lemon tree rose, modest but leafy, sharing the limited air of the garden and the generous sun of the tropics, like pillars that supported a roof of thick, veiny leaves, of a deep and proud color that was confused with its own shadow. Here and there, at his feet, various orange pots, more or less whole, from which all kinds of bushes grew flowery, some with tiny fruits hinting at the end of the branches, like a Christmas tree with the wrong decorations posts. And after all the wall, embraced by the poison ivy and its crooked, winding roads, determined to cover as much surface as possible.

1. Over a city

From those heights the city seemed submerged in calm. Long, sleepy buildings in the distance, illuminated by their own lights like circus titans, revealed the network of alleys and nocturnal lampposts spread out at their feet, a map that led each one to their homes. Here and there, unexpected, wells of neon light served as the missing trees, in that mass of concrete resembling a crust on the plain that only the mountain from which they looked interrupted.

1. Over a valley

The circuit of the mountains around the depression abounds in streams and waterfalls that nourish the valley and promote its vast flora and abundant fauna. Since their tops are not so steep, sunlight floods everything at least to the tops of the trees, mostly firs and willows, which hide the ground from view. A closer inspection would reveal a highly permeable, humus-rich soil with numerous natural ripples and depressions as they tend toward the center.

1. Over an alley

The first impression when peering into the narrow alley was that nothing could pass through there, of how crowded its corners were with containers huge pieces of trash, cardboard stacked like layers of onions and leaning against a wall, and the skeleton of an old moldy sofa face down on the half. But a few seconds later the dusty trail was revealed, lined with boot prints and dog's paws and of beer cans, as the gaze snakes between the closed windows and the light begins to shine gloom.

1. About a room

The bed in the background was just a thick white mattress on which books, boxes and other perfectly arranged objects, under a series of posters of Madonna and Peter Gabriel pasted with headband. To one side, the desk, empty and with the drawers placed on top, as if surrendering to an assailant. And a little further here, the closed closet door. A long, narrow window loomed on the opposite wall, making it necessary to constantly turn on the light: a bare bulb hanging from a thick black string of plastic cable. The floor was parquet and pristine, gleaming despite the white marks that slowly led to the door, as if someone had raked it before waxing.