Ben Newman

Benjamin Newman, a computer science graduate student at Brandeis University, has been filking since his college friends dragged him to his first convention his freshman year at Swarthmore. Since then, he has acquired two guitars and written over 130 songs on a wide range of topics, including SF and fantasy, science, computers, and religion, both singly and in various whimsical juxtapositions. Ben also ran filk programming at Philcon for several years.

This song is a representative work for the 2007 Pegasus Awards. Please note that the song itself has not been nominated.

Here Be Cartographers

Copyright © by Benjamin Newman - All Rights Reserved
Used by permission

Have you ever read "Here there be dragons,"
Out on the edge of the world that is known?
Well, if you have, go and tell your cartographers:
"Yes, there are dragons, they'd rather you left them alone!"

We'd tell them ourselves, if we knew where to find them -
We wish the maps showed where they lived, as well,
With big, bright red dots, labeled "Here be cartographers!"
We'd come and visit, and oh, what a story we'd tell!

Remember a time before maps were invented?
You made up the landscape as you went along!
And places too distant to visit for real
You could visit in stories and songs...

Try to see things from a dragon's perspective:
There's always a hero with plans for your gold,
Big shiny broadsword and no sense of humor,
Following rumor in search of adventure most bold.

A dragon's best move is to stay out of trouble.
That's quite hard enough when the parchment is blank!
But, when a map shows a dragon's location,
Life's no vacation - and we know just who we should thank!

You knew that anything you could imagine
Waited to greet you around every bend!
The land that's unknown is a mystery calling,
Oh, why did those times have to end?

The dragons are here, and they've asked you a favor,
And you've gone and asked them what's in it for you?
You with your shops full of flammable papers!
One whiff of the vapors we're breathing should give you a clue.

You've said that cartography has to keep going;
We think that you're making an awful mistake.
But, if you insist, then let's do it together:
If we could start over, just think of the maps we could make...