Three towns claim to be the site of the site of the meeting of Odysseus/Ulysses and Nausicaa. Among other thing, he claims that Sycorax, the name of Caliban’s mother, is an anagram for Corcyra (the Greek for Corfu).ĭurrell descibes mythic spots associated with The Odyssey. Durrell’s elegant friend the Count, a wealthy, hospitable man, explains at length his theory. There is a rich tradition that Corfu is the home of Shakespeare’s The Tempest. The mythic traditions are the most interesting to me. He also captures the intensity of the conversation of their many friends, who share information about Corfu’s history and myths. Lawrence Durrell describes the gorgeous island and their idyllic life of writing, gardening, picnicking, swimming, and climbing cliffs. After World War II broke out, the family fled and Lawrence ended up in Alexandria, Egypt, where hw wrote Prospero’s Cell. Both Durrell and his younger brother, Gerald, wrote about Corfu. The sea’s curious workmanship: bottle-green glass sucked smooth and porous by the waves: vitreous sells: wood stripped and cleaned, and bark swollen with salt a bead: sea-charcoal, brittle and sticky: fronds of bladderwort with their greasy marine skin and reptilian feel: rocks, gnawed and rubbed: sponges, heavy with tear: amber: bone: the sae.ĭurrell, his wife Nancy, and his mother and siblings moved to Corfu in 1935 and stayed for five years. In the passage below, he writes unconventional fragments about the sea. You either fall in love with it or you don’t. I would love to be on a Greek island right now.Ī commenter at my post on Lawrence Durrell’s The Alexandria Quartet recommended Durrell’s travel books, among them Prospero’s Cell, a memoir/history of Corfu that includes journal entries, poetry, history, a travel guide, dialogue, and letters.ĭurrell writes lyrical, dense, rhythmic, imaginative prose. Our life on this promontory has become like some flawless Euclidean statement.”–Lawrence Durrell’s Prospero’s Cell

My family and other animals setting