Waterless Sea, The: A Curious History of Mirages
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Description
Mirages have long astonished travellers and beguiled thirsty desert voyagers. Chinese and Japanese poetry and images depicted mirages as the exhalations of clam-monsters. Indian sources related them to the ?thirst of gazelles?, a metaphor for the futility of desire. From the late eighteenth century to the present, mirages became a symbol of ?Oriental despotism?, a malign, but also enchanted, emblem. But the mirage motif is rarely simply condemnatory. More commonly it conveys a sense of escape, of fascination, of a desire to be deceived.
The Waterless Sea is the first book devoted to the theories and history of mirages. Christopher Pinney navigates a sinuous pathway through a mysterious and evanescent terrain, showing how mirages have impacted politics, culture, science, and religion, and how we can continue to learn from their sublimity.
Christopher Pinney is Professor of Anthropology and Visual Culture at University College London. His publications include Camera Indica (1997), Photos of the Gods (2004) and Photography and Anthropology (2011), all published by Reaktion.
Additional information
Dimensions | 14.8 × 21 cm |
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Pages | 184 |
Ships By | 2-3 days |