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English(English) Article

A Cartographer’s Dream by Bok Goe-il | LIST

About the Article

Article: http://list.or.kr/node/744
Journal: list_Books from Korea
Issued Date: -
Page: -
Language: English(English)
Country: SOUTH KOREA
City: Seoul
Book: -
Writer: Bok Geo-il

About the Author

Bok Geo-il
Birth : 1946 ~ Unknown
Occupation : Novelist
First Name : Geo-il
Family Name : Bok
Korean Name : 복거일
ISNI : 0000000048792861
Works : 5

Descriptions - 1 Languages

English(English)

A Cartographer’s Dream by Bok Goe-il Author's Profile By Bok Geo-il on Oct 25 2014 04:45:50 Vol.24 Summer 2014 My image of myself is as a shabby cartographer haunting the wharves of Lisbon or Amster-dam at the dawn of the Great Seafaring Age in the 16th century. This cartographer patiently fills up blanks and redraws contours on his map, guessing the shapes of distant continents with tips gleaned from sailors that have crossed the dangerous seas. Though he cannot compete with the official cartographers that are supported by the royal courts and he barely makes a living, haunted by unknown continents that slowly reveal their shapes, he has dedicated his life to making a map of the world. A shabby cartographer is an apt metaphor. From my childhood I was fascinated by knowledge and aspired to be an intellectual. As George Orwell said, the most prominent feature of an intellectual is the love of knowledge that has no practical use in everyday life. But such useless knowledge is essential to make a map of this world. In the 19th century the high waves of European civilization suddenly arrived and overwhelmed East Asia. The encounter and merger of the two great civilizations was a fundamental force that shaped East Asia’s modern history. It was so vast a process that it couldn’t have been anything but all-encompassing and violent. Since the first Opium War between China and Britain erupted in 1839, all the wars in East Asia, including the civil wars of Japan, China, and Korea, came out of such encounters and syntheses of civilizations.

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