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Like an ordinary geographical dictionary,
The Dictionary of Imaginary Places contains alphabetically organized entries for more than a thousand locales. In this case, however, the locales in question are far from ordinary--they range from the orc-ridden wastes of
Tolkien's Middle-earth to the languorous shores of
Homer's Island of the Lotus-Eaters. Though for the most part these fantastical lands are mapped and chronicled with straight-faced seriousness, the encyclopedia is not without a certain deadpan wit. For example, the entry for Oz describes "a large rectangular country divided into four small countries.... As a famous visitor once remarked, Oz is not Kansas." This handsome and whimsically charming book, adorned with fanciful line drawings and maps, is rich with enough fictive detail to please the most inveterate reader.
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When the first edition of
The Dictionary of Imaginary Places debuted in 1980 (followed by an expanded paperback edition in 1987), it aimed to offer a balance between the practical and the fantastic by using the form of "a nineteenth-century gazetteer." The sense of reality was heightened by illustrations and maps. Now in this newly updated and expanded volume, the same editors have created a "travel" guide to more than 1,200 realms from books and films, with new entries for Hogwarts and Jurassic Park, among other places.
Entries are arranged alphabetically and vary in length from a paragraph or two to several pages for such destinations as Islandia, Middle-Earth, and Utopia. They offer description, history, and travel tips. Source notes at the conclusion of each entry provide author, work, and date of publication. Authors range from fiction writers to essayists, playwrights, film directors, and composers. The index lists places alphabetically under author and cross-references titles to authors. In the index, titles are listed in the original language followed by an English translation in brackets, with the English translation also listed separately.
This guide to "places that never were" delights through the different examples of the fantastic and imaginary, some familiar, such as Narnia and Oz, and others more obscure, such as Carl Sandburg's Palace of Paper Sacks, from Rootabaga Stories, and Margaret Atwood's Realm of the Jaguar Throne, from Murder in the Dark. Besides being fun to browse, the book provides serious support for literature collections. Libraries that have found the previous editions useful will want this update.
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