The article examines the antinostalgic odyssey of the protagonist of Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt’s novel Ulysses of Baghdad from mythocritical and intertextual perspectives. The ways of transformation of Homer’s original text, or rather the mythomorphoses of the renewed figures, reveal the dynamics of the evolution of the main mythical syntagma in connection with new challenges of transference in the contemporary socio-historical context. The images of the seafarer and his companions, fateful or episodic, as well as unusual metamorphoses of some mythical beings are analysed in terms of the practices of hypertext modernisation. The study attempts to examine the manifestation of the ambiguity of the personality of an ancient hero in the protagonist of Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt’s Ulysse from Bagdad. The writer of the XXI century transposes the components of the mythical story. E.-E. Schmitt uses the structure of the novel, the accepted narrative point of view. His work shows traces of modern influence of Jean Giraudoux, the master of rewriting Homeric works. The analysis leads to the confirmation of the originality of Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt’s representation of the illegal immigrant as a new figure of the modern Ulysses. The writer presents a bizarre epic of our time and questions the human condition. He makes the reader ponder the question of borders between states as a bulwark of identity or as the last stronghold of humanity’s illusions.
myth, ancient hero, rewriting myth, mythmaking, modernity.
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