The Dictionary of Imaginary Places

{{Short description|Book by Alberto Manguel and Gianni Guadalupi}} {{Infobox book | image = File:The_Dictionary_of_Imaginary_Places.png | caption = Title page for ''The Dictionary of Imaginary Places'' (1980) | author = {{plainlist | * [[Alberto Manguel]] * Gianni Guadalupi }} | language = English | pub_date = 1980 }} {{italic title}} '''''The Dictionary of Imaginary Places''''' (1980, 1987, 1999) is a book written by [[Alberto Manguel]] and [[Gianni Guadalupi]]. It takes the form of a catalogue of fantasy lands, islands, cities, and other locations from world literature—"a [[Baedecker]] or traveller's guide...a nineteenth-century [[gazetteer]]" for mental travelling.

==The book== Originally published in 1980 and expanded in 1987 and 1999, the ''Dictionary'' covers the terrains that readers of literature would expect—[[Ruritania]] and [[Shangri-La]], [[Kubla Khan|Xanadu]] and [[Atlantis]], [[L. Frank Baum]]'s [[Land of Oz|Oz]],<ref>The map of Oz is derived from the map that [[James E. Haff]] and [[Dick Martin (artist)|Dick Martin]] designed for [[The International Wizard of Oz Club]], but redrawn in squarish proportions to avoid copyright infringement. The presence of a "Davy Jones Island" on this map indicates that the inclusion of the character Davy Jones, a living wooden whale in ''[[Lucky Bucky in Oz]]'', as a decoration Martin drew on the map, was misinterpeted by the book's recartographers, as no such place appears in any Oz books up to that book's publication.</ref> [[Lewis Carroll]]'s [[Alice's Adventures in Wonderland|Wonderland]], [[Thomas More]]'s [[Utopia]], [[Edwin Abbott Abbott|Edwin Abbott]]'s [[Flatland]], [[C. S. Lewis]]' [[Narnia (fantasy world)|Narnia]], and the realms of [[Jonathan Swift]] and [[J. R. R. Tolkien]]; and also a vast host of other venues, created by authors ranging from [[Dylan Thomas]] to [[Miguel de Cervantes|Cervantes]] to [[Edgar Rice Burroughs]], from [[Carl Sandburg]] to [[François Rabelais|Rabelais]] to Sir [[Arthur Conan Doyle]]. (Plus the [[Marx Brothers]]' ''[[Duck Soup (1933 film)|Duck Soup]],'' among other non-orthodox texts.)

To remain of manageable size, the ''Dictionary'' excludes places that are off the planet Earth (eliminating many science fiction locales), as well as "heavens and hells and places of the future," and literary pseudonyms for existing places, like the [[Yoknapatawpha County]] of [[William Faulkner]] or the [[Barsetshire]] of [[Anthony Trollope]] and [[Angela Thirkell]]. It compensates by covering a wide range of anonymous and obscure sources, and volumes of forgotten lore.

The book is widely noted{{according to whom|date=March 2020}} for the number and excellence of its illustrations, by Graham Greenfield, and its maps and charts, by James Cook. Guadalupi and Manguel acknowledge Philip Grove's ''The Imaginary Voyage in Prose Fiction'' (1941), and Pierre Versins' ''Encyclopèdie de l'Utopie, des Voyages extraordinaires et de la Science-Fiction'' (1972), as precedents and inspirations.

The book had an influence on the development of early Japanese [[role-playing video games]] at [[Nihon Falcom]].<ref>{{cite web |last1=Szczepaniak |first1=John |title=What Were Japanese Action Adventures Like Before Zelda? |url=https://www.timeextension.com/features/what-were-japanese-action-adventures-like-before-zelda |website=Time Extension |publisher=Hookshot Media |access-date=3 January 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220927150029/https://www.timeextension.com/features/what-were-japanese-action-rpgs-like-before-zelda |archive-date=27 September 2022 |date=27 September 2022 |url-status=live}}</ref>

==See also== *''[[An Atlas of Fantasy]]'' *''[[Literary Wonderlands]]'' *''[[Atlas des Géographes d'Orbæ]]'', a French young adult fiction series by François Place, blending storytelling with richly illustrated maps to depict an imaginative world. * {{cite book |editor-last=Lewis-Jones |editor-first=Huw |editor-link=Huw Lewis-Jones |date=2018 |title=The Writer's Map: An Atlas of Imaginary Lands |location=Chicago |publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]] |isbn=978-0-226-59663-1}}

==Notes== {{reflist}}

==References== * Cuddon, John Anthony. ''A Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory.'' London, Blackwell, 1998. * Manguel, Alberto, and Gianni Guadalupi. ''The Dictionary of Imaginary Places.'' New York, Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1980, 1987, 1999. * Wynar, Bohdan S. ''American Reference Books Annual, 1988.'' Westport, CT, Libraries Unlimited, 1988.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dictionary of Imaginary Places, The}} [[Category:Gazetteers]] [[Category:Encyclopedias of fictional worlds]] [[Category:1980 non-fiction books]] [[Category:1987 non-fiction books]] [[Category:1999 non-fiction books]]