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In his novel, "A Mapmakers Dream - The Meditations of Fra Mauro, Cartographer to the Court of Venice", James Cowan writes the story that in sixteenth-century Venice, in an island monastery, a cloistered monk experiences the adventure of a lifetime - all within the confines of his cell, the book tells the story of fra Mauro and his struggle to realise his life´s work: to make a perfect map - one that represents the full breadth of creation. News of his project attracts explorers, pilgrims, travellers, and merchants, all eager to contribute their accounts of faraway people and places; and as Mauro listens to their strange tales, his map begins to grow and take shape. In the process, the boundaries of his world are pushed to the extreme, raising questions about the relationship between representation, imagination and the nature of reality itself.