In How To Read Literature Like a Professor, it states that hills and valleys symbolize some things in literature. I am just having trouble finding what that is.
The author describes specific characteristics of symbolic importance relating to particular types of landscapes - prairies for instance conveys a vastness and beauty, mountains - featured prominently in the works of the Romantic poets - relay a certain majesty and sublimity. Hills carry their own significance least of which is the concept of higher and lower levels of land - the latter can contain swamps, people, darkness, fields, heat, unpleasantness, life whilst the former can suggest isolation, life, death, thin air, purity, clear views to name a few. The list is not exhaustive of course, and depending on the writer, qualities can be interchanged. The dynamism of human experience is often a factor of the setting we inhabit, and it is worth paying attention to the story or poem's location.
http://www.gradesaver.com/how-to-read-literature-like-a-professor/study-guide/summary-chapters-16-20
The author also cites that hills and valleys are used to illustrate life's high and low points.
