This book is the story of one northeastern American man, E. There is a tight knit global community of wealthy map dealers and collectors that hunt for and prize the world's rarest maps, some going back 500 years.
These unique pieces of art offer us an interpretation of the known world that, in their time, demanded to be improved upon by succeeding cartographers and discoverers. They offer us a snapshot of the world before photography-a piece of history intimately connected to a specific time and place, with an unstated undercurrent of politics, religion, entrepreneurship, and exploration. What is it about old maps? Perhaps because of what is not presented, as much as what is, they draw us in and beguile us. Tracking a series of thefts as brazen as the art heists in Provenance and a subculture as obsessive as the oenophiles in The Billionaire's Vinegar, Blanding has pieced together an unforgettable story of high-stakes crime. The Map Thief interweaves Smiley's escapades with the stories of the explorers and mapmakers he knew better than anyone. Now, through a series of exclusive interviews with Smiley and other key individuals, Blanding teases out an astonishing tale of destruction and redemption. Moreover, although Smiley swears he has admitted to all of the maps he stole, libraries claim he stole hundreds more-and offer intriguing clues to prove it. Though pieces of the map theft story have been written before, Blanding is the first reporter to explore the story in full-and had the rare privilege of having access to Smiley himself after he'd gone silent in the wake of his crimes. Acclaimed reporter Michael Blanding has interviewed all the key players in this stranger-than-fiction story, and shares the fascinating histories of maps that charted the New World, and how they went from being practical instruments to quirky heirlooms to highly coveted objects. The Map Thief delves into the untold history of this fascinating high-stakes criminal and the inside story of the industry that consumed him. Forbes Smiley spent years doubling as a map thief -until he was finally arrested slipping maps out of books in the Yale University library. Once considered a respectable antiquarian map dealer, E. But to those who collect them, the map trade can be a cutthroat business, inhabited by quirky and sometimes disreputable characters in search of a finite number of extremely rare objects. "The story of an infamous crime, a revered map dealer with an unsavory secret, and the ruthless subculture that consumed him Maps have long exerted a special fascination on viewers-both as beautiful works of art and as practical tools to navigate the world.
0 kommentar(er)
