"Something odd and beautiful" : literary cartography in Jim Crace's Harvest

Abstract

Jim Crace is a unique representative of contemporary British fiction whose novels are characterised by a distinct narrative style and diction, compelling parable-like stories, and an exceptional sense of space. The settings of his novels, no matter how diverse in terms of geographic location and historical time, evince certain idiosyncratic features which make them both other and familiar for readers. Referring to himself as a “landscape writer”, Crace always explores the close interconnectedness, physical as well as mental, between his protagonists and the places they inhabit. His 2013 novel, Harvest, is even more complex in this regard as it also includes the theme of the map-making of its imaginary landscapes. Using a variety of geocritical approaches, this article attempts to show that the novel is a remarkable example of literary cartography in that it combines subjectivist and objectivist approaches to textual representation of space.