The Mapmaker

In the foggy alleys of Enlightenment-era England, where coffeehouse discourses could topple the limits of human knowledge over bites of squab pudding and dinner parties could determine the course of natural history, a singular mind moved in eccentric circles, crisscrossing paths with the aristocracy, academia, and clergy, but always forging his own, off-beaten tract. His vision was steadfastly different—a map that could show the layers of the earth. What he envisioned was not just a map, but a subterranean archive of the earth’s secrets. Balancing between stumbling across a discovery and the manic rush of invention, Moulik reimagines William Smith’s intellectual trajectory through the landscapes that shaped him—rural austerity, industrial upheaval, scientific circles marked by class division and exclusion, and long, labouring hours in canal routes and coal mines. The Mapmaker evaluates the cost of independent research, the ethics of ‘owning’ knowledge, and the often-overlooked private lives that underpin public contributions to human knowledge.