Rule - Weather is more important than just a setting.
Foster explains how weather in literature can represent much more than just a setting or what it appears to be on the outside. Weather can change plots, be used as a metaphor for characters or represent them, represent emotion, and do much more than just be weather plain and simply. Even seasons can represent more than just what they appear to be with a quick read, it’s best to look more closely at weather to get a better understanding of so much more
Examples:
The Kite Runner - The main character uses snow as a way to describe cold as not a physical feeling, but more of an emotion and how it stings and hurts to be stuck in a snowstorm. This has a deeper meaning considering what is going on in the book at the time, it is not just the character being stuck in a snowstorm, but really struggling and going through difficulties.
The Notebook - In this movie, rain is seen as romantic like lots of other forms of literature or media. This scene has a romantic scene of the two main characters kissing in the rain which can be seen in many other movies like Spiderman, Enchanted, Daredevil, and many more. Rain can be interpreted in many different ways, but romance is one that most do not consider as much as sadness or struggle.
Bleak House - In this book, fog is used to symbolize confusion and illusion rather than just simple weather. When a group of characters go to London, there is a foreshadowing of entanglement with other characters in the story which shows up later. This entanglement brings up many other struggles and the fog foreshadows this.
