Turning to a region of South Italy associated with Greater Greece and
the geographies of Homer's Odyssey, Marco Benoît Carbone delivers a
historical and ethnographic treatment of how places defined in public
imagination and media by their associated histories become sites of
memory and identity, as their landscape and mythologies turn into
insignia of a romanticised antiquity. For the ancient Greeks, Homer
had set the marine monsters of the Odyssey in the Strait between
Calabria and Sicily. Since then, this passage has been glowing with
the aura of its mythological landmarks. Travellers and tourists have
played Odysseus by re-enacting his journey. Scholars and explorers
have explained the myths as metaphors of whirlpools and marine fauna.
The iconic Strait and village of Scilla have turned into place-myths
and playgrounds, defined by the region's heritage. Carbone observes
the enduring impact of Hellas on the real Strait today. The continuous
rekindling of cultural and visual traditions of place in the arts,
media, travel, and tourism have intersected with philhellenic
historiographies, shaping local policies, public histories, views of
development, and forms of Hellenicist identitarianism. Elements of
society have celebrated the landscape of the Odyssey, appropriated
Homer as their imagined heirs, and purported themselves as the
original Europeans–pandering to outdated ideological appropriations
of 'classical' antiquity and exclusionary, West-centric views of the
Mediterranean.
Les mer
The Strait of Scylla and Charybdis in the Modern Imagination
Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9781350118201
Publisert
2021
Utgave
1. utgave
Utgiver
Vendor
Bloomsbury Academic
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter