The question of place cuts across the disciplines and the arts. Humanistic geography defines place as a center of meaning constructed by experience. In existential terms, place becomes realized as a bunch
of environmental relations created in the process of human dwelling. Place is internally connected with time and self, so that place, time and self will make up a triangle drama of which the plot is written by intimate sensing, the individual’s direct and deep personal meeting with the world. Examples of how intimate sensing works out in the many layers of place realities can be drawn from creative literature. Bo Carpelan (1926-2011) is a innish poet and novelist writing in Finland-Swedish. His novel Urwind (1993) offers an imaginative world in which to wander. Here the novel will be read from three perspectives: mimetic, hermeneutic, and textual. The ‘maps’ thus produced reflect different realms of place, ranging from the realistic depicting of territory via the interpretation of experience to the inter-textual ’dance of meaning’. The three perspectives used in reading of the novel at the same time reflect the facets of place in geographical studies at large. By way of ‘literary geography’ we will thus take a look at different geographical methodologies.
