Orient?"
"Up here, naturally, where there's Asia, and at the far end of the Orient, just where the sun rises, is the Earthly Paradise. To the left of Paradise there's Mount Caucasus, and nearby the Caspian Sea. Now bear in mind: there are three Indias: an India Major, which is very hot, just to the right of Paradise; a Northern India, beyond the Caspian Sea, another here, in the upper left, where it is so cold that the water turns to crystal, and where there are the peoples of Gog and Magog,
whom Alexander the Great imprisoned inside a wall; and finally a Temperate India, close to Africa. An Africa you see in the lower right-hand corner, where the Nile flows, and where the Arabian Sea opens and the Persian Gulf, just on the Red Sea, beyond which there is desert land, very close to the sun of the equator and so hot that no one can venture there. To the west of Africa, near Mauretania, are the Isles of the Blest or the Lost Isle, which was discovered many centuries ago by a saint from my country. Below, to the north, is the land where we live, with Constantinople on the Hellespont, and Greece, and Rome, and in the extreme north the Germanians and the Hibernian Island."
"But how can you take such a map seriously," the Poet snickered, "when it shows the earth flat, and you claim it's a sphere?"
"What kind of argument is that?" Abdul was indignant. "Could you depict a sphere in such a way that you could see everything on it?
A map must serve to point out the way, and when you walk, you see the earth flat, not round. Besides, even if it's a sphere, all the part underneath is uninhabited, and occupied by the Ocean, for if anybody were to live there he'd be living with his feet up and his head down. So to depict the upper part, a circle like this is enough. But I want to examine better the maps of the abbey, also because in the library I met a cleric who knows everything about the Earthly Paradise."
"Of course. He was there when Eve was giving the apple to Adam," the Poet said.
"You don't have to be in a place in order to know everything about it," Abdul replied. "Otherwise sailors would be more learned than theologians."
This, Baudolino explained to Niketas, showed how, ever since their first years in Paris, when they were still almost beardless, our friends had begun to be gripped by this story, which so many years later would take them to the far ends of the earth.
7. Baudolino makes the Poet write love letters and poems to Beatrice
In the spring, Baudolino discovered that his love was growing greater and greater, as happens to lovers in that season, and it was not allayed by the squalid encounters with maids of no importance, indeed in comparison it grew gigantic, because Beatrice, besides the advantages of grace, intelligence, and royal anointment, had also the advantage of absence. The fascination of absence was a question with which Abdul never ceased tormenting him, spending whole evenings stroking his instrument and singing more songs, until, fully to appreciate them, Baudolino had by now also learned Provençal.
And when the days are long in May
How sweet to hear the distant birdsong,
Because, since this journey first began,
I recall forever that distant love.
In my pain I bow my head
Nor does song ease me more, and the hawthorn...
Baudolino dreamed. Abdul despairs of seeing one day his unknown princess, he said to himself, O happy he! Worse is my suffering, for surely I will have to see my beloved again one of these days,
and I haven't the good fortune never to have seen her, but rather the misfortune of knowing who and what she is. But if Abdul finds consolation in telling his grief to us, why should I not find the same in telling my life to her? In other words, Baudolino sensed that he could discipline the throbbing of his heart by writing down on paper what he felt, and so much the worse if the object of his love would be deprived of these treasures of tenderness. So, late in the night, while the Poet was
"Up here, naturally, where there's Asia, and at the far end of the Orient, just where the sun rises, is the Earthly Paradise. To the left of Paradise there's Mount Caucasus, and nearby the Caspian Sea. Now bear in mind: there are three Indias: an India Major, which is very hot, just to the right of Paradise; a Northern India, beyond the Caspian Sea, another here, in the upper left, where it is so cold that the water turns to crystal, and where there are the peoples of Gog and Magog,
whom Alexander the Great imprisoned inside a wall; and finally a Temperate India, close to Africa. An Africa you see in the lower right-hand corner, where the Nile flows, and where the Arabian Sea opens and the Persian Gulf, just on the Red Sea, beyond which there is desert land, very close to the sun of the equator and so hot that no one can venture there. To the west of Africa, near Mauretania, are the Isles of the Blest or the Lost Isle, which was discovered many centuries ago by a saint from my country. Below, to the north, is the land where we live, with Constantinople on the Hellespont, and Greece, and Rome, and in the extreme north the Germanians and the Hibernian Island."
"But how can you take such a map seriously," the Poet snickered, "when it shows the earth flat, and you claim it's a sphere?"
"What kind of argument is that?" Abdul was indignant. "Could you depict a sphere in such a way that you could see everything on it?
A map must serve to point out the way, and when you walk, you see the earth flat, not round. Besides, even if it's a sphere, all the part underneath is uninhabited, and occupied by the Ocean, for if anybody were to live there he'd be living with his feet up and his head down. So to depict the upper part, a circle like this is enough. But I want to examine better the maps of the abbey, also because in the library I met a cleric who knows everything about the Earthly Paradise."
"Of course. He was there when Eve was giving the apple to Adam," the Poet said.
"You don't have to be in a place in order to know everything about it," Abdul replied. "Otherwise sailors would be more learned than theologians."
This, Baudolino explained to Niketas, showed how, ever since their first years in Paris, when they were still almost beardless, our friends had begun to be gripped by this story, which so many years later would take them to the far ends of the earth.
7. Baudolino makes the Poet write love letters and poems to Beatrice
In the spring, Baudolino discovered that his love was growing greater and greater, as happens to lovers in that season, and it was not allayed by the squalid encounters with maids of no importance, indeed in comparison it grew gigantic, because Beatrice, besides the advantages of grace, intelligence, and royal anointment, had also the advantage of absence. The fascination of absence was a question with which Abdul never ceased tormenting him, spending whole evenings stroking his instrument and singing more songs, until, fully to appreciate them, Baudolino had by now also learned Provençal.
And when the days are long in May
How sweet to hear the distant birdsong,
Because, since this journey first began,
I recall forever that distant love.
In my pain I bow my head
Nor does song ease me more, and the hawthorn...
Baudolino dreamed. Abdul despairs of seeing one day his unknown princess, he said to himself, O happy he! Worse is my suffering, for surely I will have to see my beloved again one of these days,
and I haven't the good fortune never to have seen her, but rather the misfortune of knowing who and what she is. But if Abdul finds consolation in telling his grief to us, why should I not find the same in telling my life to her? In other words, Baudolino sensed that he could discipline the throbbing of his heart by writing down on paper what he felt, and so much the worse if the object of his love would be deprived of these treasures of tenderness. So, late in the night, while the Poet was
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