The Cartographer Tries to Map a Way to Zion is an interesting and unusual book of poetry. Throughout its twenty-eight sections of poetry, it presents two main characters, the cartographer and the rastaman, as personifications of two different philosophical forms of knowledge. The cartographer is an emblem of scientific rationalism from a European perspective, well-intentioned but misguided. He believes that cartography is an objective science that is able to be approached without bias, one that provides facts and details for people to understand the land and even themselves a little better, carving certainty in the realm of possibilities. The rastaman, on the other hand, places little value in any physical place on Earth. He argues that a place's history and culture are inextricably linked to its physical location, and it is impossible to give a true account of a place using only hard facts about its geography.
Throughout the poems, the cartographer begins to yield to the rastaman, realizing the validity of his claims. This change most notably begins to take place in a seemingly innocuous phrase in the closing lines of "xi":
“Still, he wonders
if on his map he made our roads a little
smoother, a little straighter, as if in drawing
he might erase a small bit of history’s disgrace.”
In this poem, the cartographer realizes that his perception of a place, along with his subjective desires for its representation, has influenced his rendering on the map. He begins to understand the rastaman's point: objective cartography is nearly impossible.
This distinction in the characters' views of the nature of places leads to the book's true question: the nature of Zion, which is a representation of Heaven. The cartographer believes he can map his way to it, finding it like he can find any other place on the material surface of the world. He comes to realize, however, that the rastaman is right: it's not a place you can draw on a map. How then, can one attain Zion in one's lifetime?
The rastaman believes he has the answer. By living in a way that accords with the principles of Zion ("heartbless," or selfless charity; and "upfullness," or contemplation of the supernatural Good), one can experience a taste of heaven on earth. One does not simply walk into Zion; Zion comes and finds you.
The character is the rastaman is an interesting one. At first, he seems to be a superstitious, foolish, uneducated Jamaican villager who dislikes the cartographer's European ways. As the book progresses, however, the reader finds out that the rastaman has a PhD - from Glasgow, no less! He is clearly thoroughly versed in European philosophies, and yet he still chooses to embrace the doctrines of Rastafarianism. The reader can now detect maturity in his philosophy, which rejects scientific materialism in favor of hope in the supernatural. One is forced to wonder if Miller intended this character to represent himself: born and raised in Jamaica, Miller went to England to study literature but dropped out to write; however, he later went back and got his PhD at the University of Glasgow. These parallels seem to indicate that Miller himself is, or at least represents, the rastaman, making this book even more applicable to life.
