Odysseus’ Scar

Erich Auerbach

1942

[ . . . ] The oft-repeated reproach that Homer is a liar takes nothing from his effectiveness, he does not need to base his story on historical reality, his reality is powerful enough in itself; it ensnares us, weaving its web around us, and that suffices him. And this “real” world into which we are lured, exists for itself, contains nothing but…

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Creator Bio

Erich Auerbach

1892–1957

Literary critic and philologist Erich Auerbach was born into an affluent family in Berlin and studied law at the University of Heidelberg. After completing army service in World War I, he earned a doctorate in Romance languages and then taught at the University of Marburg. As a Jew, Auerbach lost his teaching credentials in 1935; he spent the war years in Istanbul, writing his monumental work, Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature (1946). In 1947, Auerbach came to the United States and became professor of philology at Yale University.

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