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Full Description
Brasil Island, better known as Hy Brasil, is a phantom island. In the fourteenth century Mediterranean mapmakers marked it on nautical charts to the west of Ireland, and its continued presence on maps over the next six hundred years inspired enterprising seafarers to sail across the Atlantic in search of it. Writers, too, fell for its lure. While English writers envisioned the island as a place of commercial and colonial interest, artists and poets in Ireland fashioned it into a fairyland of Celtic lore.
This pioneering study first traces the cartographic history of Brasil Island and examines its impact on English maritime exploration and literature. It investigates the Gaelicization process that the island underwent in nineteenth century and how it became associated with St Brendan. Finally, it pursues the Brasil Island trope in modern literature, the arts and popular culture.
Contents
Acknowledgements
List of Images
Preface
The Cartographic History of Brasil Island
Mediterranean Mapping and Naming
Anglicization
The Bristol Voyages and King Arthur on Brasil Island
Brasil Island in Irish Folklore
Oral Lore
Brasil Island in Literature and Legend: The Older Tradition
Gaelic Otherworlds
Clerical Sea Voyages and St Brendan's Visit to Brasil Island
Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-Century English Travellers' Tales
An Aborted Irish Attempt to Write about the Island
The Vision of Ulster: Brasil Island and National Identity
Gaelicization
"Hy Brasil: Paradise of the Pagan Irish" in Modern Literature and the Arts
From High Art to Popular Culture: Hy Brasil's Broad Appeal
Conclusion
Appendix: Cartographic Appearances of Brasil Island
Bibliography
Index
