Topographies of Hellenism: Mapping the Homeland

Description

How do people map a homeland? How does the homeland define them? Focusing on the interrelations between culture and geography, Artemis Leontis illuminates the making of modern Greece. As she fashions a new approach to contemporary Greek literature, Leontis explores the transformation of Hellenism from a cultural ideal to a nation-state. In Leontis's view, a homeland exists not when it has been inhabited, but after it has been mapped. The mapping of Hellenism, she maintains, has required that modern Greek writers reconstruct a topos, or place, for Hellenism through their own national literature. Leontis compares literary topographies of Hellenism created by Greek poets, novelists, and intellectuals from the 1880s to the 1960s with those constructed by European travelers, diplomats, and scholars. In her discussion of both modern and ancient Greek texts, she reconsiders mainstream poetics in the light of a marginal national literature. Leontis examines in particular how poetry by the Nobel laureates George Seferis and Odysseus Elytis both incorporates ancient texts and uses experimental techniques. Charting the constellation of factors that influence our sense of place, collective identity, and tradition, Leontis confronts questions central to current national struggles throughout the world.