Spiral Island

A man lives on an artificial island made of recycled plastic bottles.

Richie Sowa's Spriral Islanders


Via Boing Boing

Queequeg

In Herman Melville's Moby-Dick,Captain Ahab sets himself on a quest to find and kill the White Whale. His obsession leads to his own destruction and the death of nearly all his crew. Matt Kish also has a quest. Fortunately, this one is likely to be less destructive to himself and his colleagues. (Which is a good thing, as we both work at the same library!) He has set out to create an original piece of art, an illustration on found paper, for each page of this monumental tome.

I'm working my way through the whole book in order, beginning with page 1 and ending with page 552. I'm not working ahead or jumping around to the pages I might like the most. If all goes well, I should complete this some time in March 2011. We'll see about that.

On page 20, we are introduced to the mysterious Queequeg. Initially, this harpooner from a fictional South Pacific island causes much consternation to our hero, Ishmael. Soon, however, they become fast friends.

Matt has rendered his Queequeg on a page from a discarded book that includes a map of some islands of the South Pacific and South China Sea.

Follow Matt's quest at his blog, One Drawing for Every Page of Moby-Dick

Read a recent interview with Matt on The New Yorker's Book Bench blog.

Thar' She Blows!



UPDATE 5/27: Here is another Moby-Dick/Queegueg map from Matt's gallery:

Lost: the Map

Lost, the ABC TV series about a mysterious island and the survivors of Oceanic Flight 815, has its final episode on Sunday. [No spoilers here]

Dedicated fans at The Lost Map blog have carefully noted the location of important events on their replica of the island map found with the character, Rousseau.



However, the folks at The Joy of Tech comic have created a map/chart that accurately measures my interest in the series. (I couldn't care enough get past the first season.)



HT to Scott "Henry Miller" Morris

San Serriffe

Cartophilia does not need April Fools day to publish maps of imaginary countries... but more respectable publications, such as The Guardian, have reputations to uphold. Don't you know?

On April 1, 1977, the Guardian published a seven-page supplement devoted to the previously unknown island state of San Serriffe.



More details at The Museum of Hoaxes.

No man is an island, but there sure are a lot of them

It has been too long since I did an all-map-postcard post. While looking through a stack of cards in my collection, I noticed a number of islands scattered throughout. So, let's take a tour.

We'll start close to home, with the islands of Marth's Vineyard and Nantucket.



Interesting factoids: Martha's Vinyard is the 57th largest island in the United States and Nantucket is famous for being the subject of limericks.

Bermuda is a British territory in the North Atlantic, famous for popularizing a style of uniform shorts.



The Dominican Republic is on the good side of the island of Hispaniola. For the last forty years, they have been able to avoid most of the political turmoil that plagues their island-mate, Haiti.



Jamaica is the birthplace of the Rastafari movement and Reggae music, as well as some pretty good rum. Good jams, mon, good jams.



Christopher Columbus named the Virgin Islands afer Santa Ursula y las Once Mil Vírgenes, shortened to Las Vírgenes, after Saint Ursula and her 11,000 virgins. The islands are divided between the United States and the United Kingdom.







Across the Atlantic in the direction of north Africa lies Fuerteventura, one of the Canary Islands of Spain. (See more of my Canary Islands map postcards.) The island was formed about 5 million years ago by volcanic eruption. Today its economy depends heavily on tourism.





Finally, let's head over to the northern Aegean Sea. Across the millenia, the island of Thasos has been ruled by Phoenicians, Greeks, Persians, Romans, Turks, and Bulgarians. Today it is part of the nation of Greece. The island has been strategicaly important because of deposits of lead, silver, gold, copper, calamine and iron.

Philippines

A postcard collector from the Philippines contacted me and we are now trading postcards. She sent me these beautiful cards from her homeland:



Spain colonized the islands in the 16th century. During the Philippine Revolution, they briefly won independence until occupied by the United States during the Spanish American War. The Filipino people continued to struggle for independence until the end of World War II. The nation became independent in 1946.



In 1972,President Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law. The People Power Revolution of 1986, led by Corazon Aquino, widow of the assassinated opposition leader, Benigno Aquino, ultimately overthrew that authoritarian rule.



In 2008, President Bush expressed his regard for the Filipino people: "I am reminded of the great talent of the -- of our Philippine Americans when I eat dinner at the White House.... And the chef is a great person and a really good cook, by the way, Madam President."



Contact me if you have map postcards to trade. I have many postcards, some with maps, others without, available to trade with you.


#217

Life, the Universe, and Your Own Private Island Paradise

A couple weeks ago I posted about "The World" real estate development in Dubai. Apparently, the folks in Dubai are not stopping with "the world"... next stop, "The Universe":



What you see in the photo above is just the beginning. "The Universe will feature man-made islands built in the shape of the Sun and the Moon, with a string of planets in between." The project will take 15 to 20 years for completion.

If you cannot wait, here are the Top 10 Man-Made Island Paradises from International Listings.

Zoran Island is planned for Phuket, Thailand. Finally! A place where I can park my superyacht!



Or, if you prefer the romance of Venice, without leaving the United States, there are these new Venetian Islands, near Miami. Not sure if there are any singing gondoleers, but these islands have been under construction since 1922, and if you are ready to own one, I'm sure they can dredge something up.