An Atlas of Fantasy (review)

Accompanying the burgeoning interest in fantasy there seems to be an inveterate desire to chart these areas of the intangible. The maps in this atlas almost anchor their fantasy worlds to our more tangible world of every day, by providing them with spatial and temporal coordinates. An Atlas of Fantasy was first published in 1973 by Mirage Press in Baltimore. It has now been revised and redesigned in its present paperback format, but unfortunately remains a pseudo-reference tool, deceptively titled and ill-constructed for rapid retrieval of information. Disappointing to the scholar, at $8.95 it is overpriced for the casual browser as well.

The purpose of this compilation is to offer a guidebook to "lands that never were." In his prefatory essay, "On Charting Unknown Realms," Post groups "maps of imaginary lands derived from literary sources" in a subcategory under the umbrella term "cartographic fantasy." Besides mapping realms familiar to children and young adults, such as "Pooh's Turf," Toad Hall, Swallows and Amazons, Pern, Middle-earth and Earthsea, the atlas also covers Faulkner's Yoknapatawpha County, Trollope's Barsetshire and Al Capp's Slobbovia. Post clearly regards "fiction" and "fantasy" as synonymous terms. "Cartographic fantasy" refers simply to "those maps which are nonrepresentational of the real world in approved ways." Hence the inclusion of maps of Thomas More's Utopia, the Gospel Temperance Railroad map and a 'fantastic voyage' through an Alimentary Canal through the kindness of O. Soglow.

The interval between publications was evidently filled with researching new maps from more recently published works, redrawing and rephotographing some to improve legibility. The overall quality of reproduction still varies. Omissions such as maps from Alan Garner's Weirdstone, Neverland and the Ponderosa Ranch are due to a variety of reasons including money, permissions and availability.

The book's 8¼" × 11" shape is reminiscent of a picture album where one would expect to find old friends that jog the memory. The lushly colored cover sets a mood of exotic romance by depicting a globe, calipher and other old-fashioned cartographer's tools surrounded by colored maps of Atlantis, the Planet Mongo and Treasure Island. It is therefore a great disappointment that all the maps, more than 100 in number, are in black and white. The lack of color in many cases detracts from the legibility and aesthetic enjoyment of the map and the realm to be explored, besides causing some consternation at the overpricing. The layout is well handled with left page bold type catch-title and single or double column remarks followed by the map(s) on the right page or succeeding pages. The annotations vary. Some are solely plot summarizations while others describe the evolution of the map, or give bibliographic references to other sources or explain the levels and functions represented in a particular map.

As a reference tool it is handicapped by lack of an author/title index that would aid in speedy retrieval of specific information. As it is now, one must either search the table of contents or hope to find specific citations through the use of an illustrator's index. It would also be more helpful if the maps were arranged in some sort of order, perhaps by genre such as science fiction, children's literature, literary classics or even chronological order. Even improved organization, however, would not compensate for the absence of critical discrimination implied in the confounding of "fiction" and "fantasy" here.