In this course, students will consider relationships between two meanings of the word “plot”—a piece of land, and a sequence of events. How does a fictional “plot,” for example, relate to the geographical space of its setting? Looking at maps alongside works of fiction invites us to ask such questions about traditional issues in the study of narrative that include perspective, spatiality, temporality, and characterization. Using the library’s collection of maps from rare books, we will study historical maps of the new world, colonial exploration, and urban development. The bulk of the course is devoted to novels, each of which has a pronounced relationship to geographical or urban space. We will also read theories of fiction that emphasize the significance of perspective or point of view, issues that are always at play in map-reading and map-making, and criticism from the field of “literary cartography.”