Mapping the Renaissance World: The Geographical Imagination in the Age of Discovery (The New Historicism: Studies in Cultural Poetics)

Lestringant, Frank

ISBN 10: 0520088719 / ISBN 13: 9780520088719

Published by University of California Press, 1994

About this Item

Bright and crisp copy with no markings. Dust jacket has light shelf-wear but no creasing, chips or tears. 197 pages including index.

Seller Inventory # 047291

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Mapping the Renaissance World: The Geographical Imagination in the Age of Discovery (The New Historicism: Studies in Cultural Poetics)
• Publisher: University of California Press
• Publication Date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0520088719
• ISBN 13: 9780520088719
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good
• Seller catalogs:
  • History: Middle Ages/Renaissance

About this title

Synopsis

At the turn of the sixteenth century, princes and navigators presided over a geographical revolution that fundamentally altered the way people viewed the world. Focusing on the great traveller and map maker, André Thevet, Lestringant examines the audacity of the cosmographer, who rivaled God in the creation of new worlds. Accused of blasphemy and mocked for his encyclopedic aims, Thevet is a wonderful example of how knowledge was transformed during the decline of the Renaissance.

Lestringant describes Thevet's mapping of a Brazil of Amazons, cannibals, and kings. He describes how French colonialists' experience with the Tupinamba Indians gave rise to the myth of the noble savage. He discusses the European acceptance of the image of the naked cannibal at a time of religious and social crisis. Mapping the Renaissance World is a brilliant account of the part played by the French in the conquest of the New World.

About the Author

Frank Lestringant is Professor of Renaissance Literature at the University of Lille III.