Cartography & conflict

: A map of ghosts a novel - The art of the map - critical component

Abstract

Creative component ‘A Map of Ghosts’ is a novel about Ireland, maps and ghosts. The narrator is the ghost of Richard Bartlett, an Elizabethan cartographer who was employed by the notorious Lord Mountjoy during the Nine Years War (1594-1603) In the afterlife, the fictional Bartlett is shackled to a book of maps which reveals the Gaelic kingdom of Ulster before the villages, castles, woodland and sacred sites were destroyed by war and the colonial ambitions of the English. Bartlett cannot understand why he is a ghost and, as the centuries pass, he revisits episodes from his life in a search for answers. Through the figure of Bartlett, I explore the power of maps in the years leading up to the plantation; maps as the eye of history; the Elizabethans in Ireland; sin and atonement. 
Critical component ‘The Art of the Map’ investigates a context for the maps of cartographer Richard Bartlett which are held in the National Library of Ireland. Chapter One gives a context for Bartlett’s maps within the history of maps of Ireland from Ptolemy to the Elizabethans. In Chapter Two, I consider the drawing and cartographic tools an Elizabethan map-maker would have had at his disposal; in Chapter Three I give consideration to the purpose of Bartlett’s maps; whether they were intended for display or for inclusion in a book.

Thesis embargoed until 31 July 2027

Date of Award	Jul 2022
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	Queen's University Belfast
Sponsors	Arts & Humanities Research Council
Supervisor	Ramona Wray (Supervisor) & Glenn Patterson (Supervisor)