Rezeptionsgeschichte from Either End

Two new books whose BMCR reviews were noted by the RogueClassicist look interesting and relevant to the subject here.  The first (in German), A. Luther (ed.), Odysseerezeptionen, with articles on the use of Odysseus' story in ancient and modern times:

Stefan Kipf (95-108) is primarily concerned with the figure of Telemachos in modern and contemporary literature for children. Beginning with Fénelon's "Aventures de Télémaque" and then (less fruitfully) Gustav Schwab's "Die schönsten Sagen des klassischen Altertums", Kipf looks for traces of Telemachos' role in modern paedagogy as a model of wisdom and maturity. It is very interesting to learn that in most contemporary renderings of the Odyssean plot, the whole Telemachy is either heavily abridged or eliminated tout court. All the more significant is the case, duly highlighted by Kipf, of Peter Hacks' book "Prinz Telemach und sein Lehrer Mentor" (1997). From an Italian perspective, one might add that in our own days "Telemaco" is the name of both a well-known junior reading club in Piemont and a national program for social assistance to young people. However, in a book devoted to continuity, I think one further issue ought to have been mentioned. Even if one does not believe that the relative abundance of Telemachy-papyri in schoolhands should be explained in the light of moralistic teaching,  there is no doubt that the ancients had already developed a clear sense of the paedagogical purport of Telemachus' adventures, as is certified by several scholia focusing of Telemachos' paideia and psychology.

Andreas Goltz's paper (109-124) starts with a brief documented survey of the films drawn from or inspired by the Odyssey: my only complaint regards the absence of Theo Angelopoulos' "Ulysses' Gaze" (with Harvey Keitel, and terrific music by Eleni Karaindrou), probably one of the best films of this kind. Goltz concentrates on a comparison between Camerini's "Odissea" (1954, with Kirk Douglas and Silvana Mangano) and Konchalovsky's "The Adventures of Ulysses" (1997, with Armand Assante and Greta Scacchi): this turns out to be a very fruitful procedure that highlights some overall and some minute differences that can be explained by referring to the cultural climate in which each movie was born (the presence of the gods; the handling of Ulysses' adulteries; the hero's cruelty after his homecoming). Anyone wishing to experience how artistically powerful the chill of the ancient world can be in contemporary cinema, should visit Francesco Vezzoli's "Caligula", currently on display at the Italian Pavillion of the Biennale in Venice.

The other is about Shakespeare's "little Latin and less Greek":  Martindale and Taylor (eds.), Shakespeare and the Classics.  Here's just a teaser:

As modern reappraisals of ancient authors and genres enter the picture, Renaissance scholars following our lead are able to recognize unexpected innovations and affinities between their texts and ours on ideological as well as aesthetic levels. Even more striking for Shakespeare in particular is the recognition that his presentation of classical antiquity itself informs our own view of the ancient world, with all the challenges and potential circularities that such a complex process of reception entails. Such realizations create opportunities for discussion across our departmental divides are genuinely exciting, and if the present collection did little more than represent the current variety of perspectives on the set of problems raised by its title, it would be valuable. But it does more.