Geography and Vision. Seeing, Imagining and Representing the World

Geography and Vision is a series of personal reflections by leading cultural geographer, Denis Cosgrove, on the complex connections between seeing, imagining and representing the world geographically. Ranging historically from the sixteenth century to the present day, the essays include reflections upon discovery and the role of imagination in giving it meaning; colonisation and sixteenth century gardening; the shaping of American landscapes; wilderness, imperial mappings and masculinity; urban cartography and utopian visions; conceptions of the Pacific; the cartography of John Ruskin; and the imaginative grip of the Equator. Extensively illustrated, this engaging work reveals the richness and complexity of the geographical imagination as expressed over the past five centuries.
"A richly evocative set of meditations on landscape and vision by a master craftsman. The essay format – a much neglected literary form in contemporary human geography – suits Cosgrove to perfection as he sketches and speculates, provokes and probes. Across myriad times and spaces, he displays for us the kaleidoscope of meanings that we humans have attached to the terrestrial sphere. Each essay is a delightful creation fashioned by an artist whose eye is informed throughout by a profound geographical sensibility." (David Livingstone, OBE, Professor of Geography and Intellectual History, Queen’s University, Belfast)