Ritorni Difficili

Based on the prestigious Balzan Lectures delivered at the Accademia dei Lincei in Rome, this book outlines a whole series of “difficult returns,” as the title promises, starting with Odysseus’ problematic homecoming, moving on to the Greek diaspora in Lycophron’s Alexandra and its reworking in Virgil’s Aeneid, and later, to the constant sense of displacement and replacement in Apuleius’ Metamorphosis. With some help from Foscolo’s sonnet of non-return, the argument here is that literature itself provides an opportunity for returning and revisiting, even while we move forward to new foundations.