Field Notes - ENGL 817AJ - Topographical Poetry and Mind Mapping

Michael Drayton's Poly-Olbion poem from 1612 is hard to follow. Even when I had the map side-by-side with it you think things are coming up based on the map and you're looking for them but then its like another 20 lines (or more) before the landmark you're looking for is actually mentioned. Once things in the poem go rolling along it was much easier to follow though. It is also a very pretty map.

John Wilson Foster's article on topographical poetry mentions a lot about how historical musings, recollections and reflections are common in this genre of poetry which made the mentions of King Arthur and Trojan war in the poem make much more sense.

In the Poly-Olbion, line 183 of Song One mentions King Arthur's battle with Mordred. It explains how the river Camel was the backdrop for this fight but also that it was the birth place of Arthur. Camel... sounds a lot like Camelot. The river is saddened by Arthur's death so long ago; she has a personality. Many of the rivers and waters and islands in Drayton's poem are gendered and have names, have personalities.

Foster also outlines the "five genre characteristics of topographical poetry": "use of extensive description; use of space as a patterning device; use of time-projections; use of extended metaphor; development of a controlling moral vision" (pg. 403). Do some or all of these characteristics show up in the Poly-Olbion? A thorough investigation would be required, but based on what I've read so far, time-projection, extended metaphor and controlling moral vision all appear in Song One.

As part of this section of the class, it was also recommended that we read part of a book on origins of the British Ordinance Survey that was started all the way back in the mid-1750s. I quite enjoyed this bit of informational reading. It obviously needed someone super into mapping like William Roy to get things really going on the survey despite so many delays over the many years before it can to fruition.

The theodolite instrument that was used in the ordinance survey also sounds really neat!

__________________________________________

Reading further ahead into the cognitive and mental mapping part of the course was intense and very fascinating. The short story, "A Good Man is Hard to Find" by Flannery O'Connor was the intense part. It did not go the way I was thinking and more violent than I anticipated. I'm curious how the story fits into the mental mapping exercise that was explored in the article - I mean, I think I have an idea, but I'm still interested on how it fits in with the course materials and the direction of the class.

Speaking of the case study - It was really neat! The explanation and exploration of how mental mapping works was fascinating. I like that it showed and broke down some of the maps that the students created as part of the project. Everyone's mind works so differently when visualizing and then trying to map out the descriptions of a book. It tied in really well with all the discussion we already had with More's Utopia. Do things match up with the representations and the text? What is more prominent, more important between the different maps the participants made? How is spatiality converted and depicted from description to cartographic representation?

__________________________________________

I'm ahead in my readings so that I have ample time to tackle Gaiman's Neverwhere (1996) in good time for mid-March. Before that is a section of readings on maps as analytical instruments. I'll probably work that information into the Field Notes post for Neverwhere as well as we get two weeks with that book as well as a few other articles.

Field Notes - ENGL 817AJ - Utopia by Thomas More

I think my seminar presentation for More's Utopia (1516) in class went REALLY well. I focused on that previous quote from J.B. Harley (see last post) about deconstructing the map. I looked at both woodcut maps that came out with More's book in the 1500s and how and if they depicted on them the utopia and its people that he was writing about. I also found an article that compared Utopia to Eden and the Christian religious undertones present in Utopia even though it is supposed to be a depiction of a fantasy island that is somehow also supposed to be real. A bit confusing if you have not read the book.

The left image is the 1516 map and the right hand one is from 1518, made by Ambrosius Holbien.

There were a lot of things about the book that I noticed and drew comparisons with, but that could not be included in my seminar paper. Before I get into those, I'll start with a little bit of an overview of the book to start.

Book I is very philosophical about the goods and bads, and rights and wrongs of 16th C England, society and the monarchy. At first I didn't think this really had a lot to do with the focus of the class, but I was wrong. Especially after the focus I took with my seminar paper. There is also a lot in the dialogue of this part of the text about exploration of the New World and its cultures and laws. 

The dialogue in Book I is between Raphael, the explorer that comes back from Utopia, and Morus, the Englishman he is trying to convince that Utopia is so great. They start the conversation by discussing the punishment of thieves and murders, which then results in the explanation of Utopian society. Raphael gives extensive accounts of the Utopian's rules and how they would in turn apply to England or France. Basically, its a cleverly disguised treatise on how to make England a better place than it was.

Book II starts with the geography and physical description of the Utopian Island but then leads into the division of land, farming techniques, their societal responsibilities, military and political structure, and ends with the more internal revelations about their morality, philosophy and religious practices.

In a supplementary letter it is noted that the location of the island is conveniently missed in during the conversation with Raphael and neither Morus or Peter catches it. Obviously, the location was never to be ascertained because the island is not real, but the book is written to make the island believable to the readers of the 16th Century. I believe that More did not write about or try to make up a location for the island so to not upset the world-view prevalent during his time, but the book is still a tool to help bring about change that the humanists of the time wanted. Translated from Latin, Utopia means "no place" - so its basically a pun.

Bonus points for me in class though! I linked the mapping of the Utopian Island in More's book to the creation and blueprint of the utopian literary genre that came about as a result of the text. 

__________________________________________

I read More's Utopia when I was on holiday in Mexico and many of the things I noted and jotted down to put in the Field Notes were how Utopia was a lot like Star Trek. Sadly, I wasn't able to put these things into my seminar paper, but wouldn't that have been a fun read! It reminds me of Star Trek because of the exploration of uncharted space, and during the 16th C the Earth as a whole was becoming less and less a mystery due to expansive exploration of the New World and the oceans.

One particular quote stood out to me:

"For justice cannot exist where all the best things in life are held by the worst people; nor can anyone be happy where property is limited to a few, since even those few are always uneasy, and the many are utterly wretched."

I hope I am not the only who thinks that sounds a lot like Spock's: "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one." Bueller? Bueller?

Another thing that is very Star Trekkie is the non-use of gold or silver in Utopian society. Yes, there are credits used for buying power within the federation but it is not the driving thing of their whole society. Everyone has food because of the matter synthesizers and careers in certain things such as service in the fleet is a lofty and ideal goal. To serve humanity, Earth and the Federation.

I do have to note thought that my husband, well versed in Star Trek and a big fan, did note that the Federation in Star Trek is very much like a cult too. They acquire other planets into the Federation, give them some autonomy but ultimately everything is subsumed under the Federations paradigm. Food for thought.

__________________________________________

Next field notes is going to be a combination of a few things like topographical poetry and academic articles focusing on mental mapping and using the map as an analytical instrument These are going to be read in advance of their times slots for the class so that I have more time to read Neverwhere (1996) for March. This weekend is going to busy with lots of reading to try and get ahead.

Field Notes - ENGL 817AJ - Ulysses "Wandering Rocks" Episode by James Joyce

We didn't read all of James Joyce's Ulysses (1920) but we read the key "Wandering Rocks" episode because of the way it not only maps the city of Dublin, but it maps the cultural and social interconnectedness of the characters and the city they inhabit.

I noted that it is bookended with the journey of Father Conmee at the start and the cavalcade at the end. Both of these journeys come into contact with the most people present in the episode's vignettes. It was nice to have the Harry Blamires confirm that this is intentional in his A Guide through 'Ulysses'! So, bonus points for me! It was also fascinating that the seminar presentation for the class discussion also brought up that the bookends of Conmee and the cavalcade are representative of the Church and State power dynamics that were at play during the time of the novel. This was not an interpretation that I even remotely picked up on, so bonus points for the presenter!

I'm not a huge James Joyce fan, nor I have I read the entirety of Ulysses, so I don't have as much to comment about this partial text as I have the others. Most of what I could think about when reading the excerpt was how confusing it was, who all the characters were and why I felt like I needed to get out a map and try and follow where Father Conmee was going. Luckily, when more characters were introduced I was glad I didn't do that. Way too complicated.

I think it was in the Blamires article that is was written: "In the Odyssey Circe warns Ulysses to avoid the wandering rocks, which are a menace to navigation, and he does so". This is a neat piece of information considering that all the characters in the "Wandering Rocks" episode of the text are inter-connected in one way or another. Some don't get distracted and can keep on their paths well enough, but others do get hung up by one another, or one character consistently manages to interrupt the paths of many others.

As part of the readings for the week we discussed Joyce, we read an article by J.B. Harley called "Deconstructing the Map" that covered topics about the power/knowledge and the process of evaluating maps and using Foucault and Derrida's theories. These are a couple of quotes from the article that stuck out to me:

"A map says to you, 'Read me carefully, follow me closely, doubt me not.' It says, 'I am the earth in the palm of your hand. Without me, you are alone and lost.'" (Beryl Markham, 1983)

We have brought it up a few times in class that maps are way-finding tools and many of the characters that we are encountering in the texts are lost, wandering, don't know where they are going per se. So the above quote really piqued my interest in that it is relating to that thread of thought that keeps emerging.

This next quote is Harley's expansion on the ideas of H.G. Blocker's Philosophy and Art in the context of maps:

"Deconstruction urges us to read between the lines of the map – 'in the margins of the text' – and through its tropes to discover the silences and contradictions that challenge the apparent honesty of the image. We begin to learn that cartographic facts are only facts within a specific cultural perspective. We start to understand how maps, like art, far from being 'a transparent opening to the world', are but 'a particular human way...of looking at the world'."

This particular quote is what got me thinking on my current train of thought and ideas that I've got swirling in my head about my Utopia seminar paper. I'm thinking about the "specific cultural perspectives" that are tied to More's woodcut maps of Utopia that were created to be published with the novels. This might be the basis for my seminar paper argument... 

__________________________________________

I've researched and written quite a bit of my Utopia since I drafted this post, and, let's just say, I'm happy with how its coming along. Can't wait to present it on Feb 6th! After that its on to some poetry involving maps that or are like maps in the way they're written before we move on to Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere (1996) in mid-March. Exciting things ahead!

Field Notes - ENGL 817AJ - Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson

Second book for this class was Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island (1883). It was a fun action/adventure story with a lot of history and facts about how the story came to be that Stevenson wrote about in his "My First Book" reflection.

I'm thinking about focusing on Treasure Island for my term paper and that's where the inclusion of Muppet Treasure Island from 1996 might come in. Some further research is needed and I will list what questions I'm going to ponder and look at while watching the movie (its been a very long time since I've seen it) at the end of this post.

Anyways, here is the map that inspired the story of Treasure Island:

As I mentioned, the providence of the map is a little questionable. Stevenson claimed that it was he who created the map, but his step-son also later claimed that it was him who made it (he was a child at the time) and that Stevenson appropriated it for his story. So, again, like The Hobbit, authenticity of the map's author is at play. But, in the case of Treasure Island, its about the creator of the map before the story, not so much the author within the text. In the text, Captain Flint, former captain of Long John Silver and associates, is the author of the map. 

Furthermore, as Stevenson notes in "My First Book", the original map that inspired the story was lost during the publication process and therefore, the map had to be recreated from the details in the story. So, who then is the actual author of the map that was published with the novel? Stevenson notes that his own father signed the map as the hand of the map-maker in the story. Is Stevenson's father the actual author then, and not Stevenson or his step-son? This makes for an interesting line of thought and questioning.

Moving on to details in the text about the map and how it plays within the story:

1. I want to note how easily decipherable Long John Silver's mutiny was going to be by the very clear foreshadowing of having Silver's Inn named "The Spyglass Inn" which is an exact match to Spyglass Hill on the treasure map. It was a complete and total dead giveaway. I was a little disappointed that it was that obvious and there wasn't a little bit more of a build up to for the readers to actually be shocked when Jim overhears Silver's backstabbing plans. But alas.. I guess this is a children's book.
   
   
2. The idea and plan that it was a treasure map makes the location - the easily obtainable and decipherable location - of the island disappointing as well. I was craving some The Goonies-esque puzzle-solving and exploring. Not so much what I found in the pages of Stevenson's novel. Billy Bones kept the map hidden and secret for quite sometime just to have Silver and the remnants of Flint's crew come in and just know where to go. That doesn't scream treasure map and adventure time story to me.
   
   
3. It was noted in class (for which I was not present, but I got notes from someone) that the even though Treasure Island was not a real island it is still rooted in the real-world because of the all the references to where the voyage starts on the Spanish main. Based on this and the vector of the voyage, the island is located in the Caribbean. This makes it real and not-real because the island is part of the world, but is also just off-world in the fantastical because it is indeed not a real island at all. This was an interesting observation that I had not picked up on when reading the text.
   
   
4. The scale of the island (9 miles by 5 miles) makes a lot of plot points in the text plausible. Such as the fact the Jim, a young boy, was able to traverse and find his way around the island without getting lost or into too much trouble. But that makes the island also very small then too. It would be quite hard to locate at all without the very specific directions the map provides.
   
   
5. I really should have followed along on the map when things were happening in the story. I'm not one to usually reference maps in books (this class is likely to change that), but in the case of Treasure Island, I really should have been using the map more. Particularly when the characters were wandering around on the island and referencing the landmarks and most definitely when the Hispaniola was drifting along the coast and Jim sailed it to the other bay. I was very lost on the directions and where this was happening along the coast.

Now, for Muppet Treasure Island these are the questions that are on my mind already and what I'll be thinking about and taking notes on while I watch:

• Is the map the same or different in the film?
• Is the map used the same or differently in the film?
• How does the map factor into the story in the film versus the book? Same or different?
• Are the character interactions with the map the same or different in the film?
• Is the island the map depicts more real or fantastical in the film? Or is it a mix like in the book?
• Does the film treat the map more like a treasure map or like a locations map such as the book?
• How does the film depict the 2D island from the map into a 3D visual for the screen?
• How similar is the visualization? Or, are there very glaring differences?
• Does the MTI map lend itself to the creation of the story on film like the drawn map did for the text? Basically, where were the creative liberties, often taken with film, evident and used?

I'll likely have more questions as I watch, but these are the key things I'm keeping in mind.

On a side note, someone on the internet made a funny observation about Muppet Treasure Island in the below meme (originally posted by sephiramy on tumblr). And, like the response says, I think they're point is spot on.

     

__________________________________________

Upcoming field notes on James Joyce's Ulysses "Wander Rocks" episode (1920) and Thomas More's Utopia (1516). I have some thoughts and ideas I've been pondering about for my seminar paper for Utopia including a possible link to Star Trek that I'm exploring (I've been keeping jot notes for these so they don't get lost). The Utopia post will be after my paper and presentation is completed... so, there may even be some notes on places I wish I could have gone with my seminar.