Literature and Cartography by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: literary studies; maps; narrative fiction; books; information science; mapping; geography; media studies
Publisher: MIT Press
Published: 2017-12-22T00:00:00+00:00

Mannered Waters

Oronce’s topographic projection belongs to a manual of science written in pellucid vernacular. By contrast, Pierre de Ronsard’s “Voyage de Tours ou amoureux” (1560), a poem that might be called a fragment of lyrical topography, tells of a trip on the part of Thoinot (Jean-Antoine de Baïf) and his friend Perrot (Pierre de Ronsard), in longing pursuit of their beloved Francine and Marion. Narrated tongue in cheek, the lyric takes an ironic distance from collections of Amours that both authors dedicated to the women who figure in this longer piece of verse. Like butterflies and little bees (avettes), fluttering and buzzing about, pollinating flowers in the gardens of the Touraine, fragile creatures that they are, the two men worry about the future of their race. Perrot loves Marion (Marie de Bourgueil, Ronsard’s object of desire in La Continuation des Amours of 1555) and Thoinot, Francine (a fictive female, avatar of the same poet’s Méline of 1552). A point of reference is the Clain, a river near Châtelleraut that empties into the Vienne where, at the sight of Francine, head over heels, Thoinot discovers her name engraved in his heart. The voyage begins from Coustures, a village on the River Loire, located near Ronsard’s La Possonière, before passing south, by the author’s cherished Forest of Gastine, then along the same axis, down to nearby Marray. En route they pass through Beaumont-la-Ronce and stop by Langennerie before sighting, to the west of the city of Tours, the tower of the priory of Saint-Cosme. Having consulted a soothsayer in “Crotelles” (Croutelle), to the south and not far from the River Clain, Thoinet learns that he is under Love’s jurisdiction and in the throes of Eros:

Why, tired of dance, recumbent amidst flowers,

Haven’t I leaned on your lap or your head,

Or set my eyes on yours, or my mouth

Upon your two breasts born of snow and ivory?

Do I seem too old for you? A tender beard

Only now begins to spread over my cheek,

And your mouth, more beauteous than coral

Were it to kiss me, would be my bounty.7

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