Vivere con i classici

“Embalming the Greeks and Romans robbed them of their strength, that is, their conflicting modernity” (from Luciano Canfora’s Introduction).

A reflection on how the role of the classics changes in everyday life through six captivating and thought-provoking stories signed by some of the great authors of the moment.

“I hate the classics. They are a horror, a nightmare. To begin with, who would these classics be? I had always thought they were the writers, philosophers and sculptors who lived in Greece and Rome so many years ago. But no, one fine day I made the discovery that authors like Dante, Balzac, Kant and painters like Velázquez and Michelangelo are also considered classics. All people who lived a long time after the real classics, the ones with the toga, the bum and the leather sandals, to be clear. What do you mean? Shouldn’t what is not classical be modern? It seems not. They say anything that happened in culture a long time ago but still works today as a kind of guide, to show us the way, is classical. I’m not convinced by that either, though.”