Otherworlds

Mediterranean Lessons On Escaping History

Federico Campagna (Independent Scholar, UK)

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Paperback

Forthcoming
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English

Bloomsbury
01 July 2025

Philosophy; Western philosophy: Ancient, to c 500; Social & political philosophy; Ancient religions & mythologies

What can survive the end of the world?

In Otherworlds, philosopher Federico Campagna

constructs extraordinary stories and alternative

histories of the Mediterranean, nexus of migrations

and odysseys, ruins and romances, to depict a world in which the imagination is the only engine of survival.

Chapter by chapter, Campagna chronicles the

existential challenges posed by history and the

inventive and radical responses of people facing

the ruin of their world. From the earliest myths with

which the inhabitants of the kingdoms around the

Mediterranean constructed a shared social reality,

the stories of the Mediterranean are dominated

by cataclysm and collapse in which fugitive

fragments become the building blocks of resilience

and renewal. Alexander the Great’s cataclysmic

conquests seed a cycle of existential romances;

pagan philosophers fleeing the fall of Rome give

rise to new visions of reality; translators across the

Islamic world, Iberia and Italy use stories to bridge

the gap between cultures at war and pirates, slaves,

renegades and publishers expand the imaginative

horizons of human possibility through modernity and beyond.

In Campagna’s lyrical, novel and expansive work

– part history, part philosophy, part love letter to

a heritage of seasonal migration and searches

for belonging – the challenges of disintegration

and destruction are time and again met with the

creation of new and radical realities. As rich and

various as the philosophy, myths, literature and art

of the Mediterranean itself, Otherworlds traces the

tales of these attempts to reinvent the world – and

reveals how, at the most dramatic and decisive

junctures of Mediterranean history, it was the ability

to set sail for these other worlds which prevailed

By: Federico Campagna (Independent Scholar UK)
Imprint: Bloomsbury
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 232mm, Width: 156mm, Spine: 26mm
Weight: 600g
ISBN: 9781350536388
ISBN 10: 1350536385
Pages: 392
Publication Date: 01 July 2025
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Forthcoming

0. Introduction: Seasons. 1. Mortals – The Bronze Age 2. Foreigners – Hellenism 3. Cosmonauts – Late Antiquity 4. Translators – The Middle Ages 5. Traitors – Modernity 6. Migrants – The Contemporary Age Bibliography and Further Reading Endnote

Federico Campagna is an Italian philosopher based in London. His latest books, Prophetic Culture (Bloomsbury, 2021) and Technic and Magic (Bloomsbury, 2018) explored how ‘worlds’ can be born, destroyed, and created anew. He is a Lecturer in Intellectual History at the art university ECAL in Lausanne, Associate Fellow at the Warburg Institute in London, and Critical Fellow at the Royal Academy Schools in London. He is the co-founder of the Italian philosophy publisher Timeo and a director at the Anglo-American radical publisher Verso. He frequently collaborates as public speaker, podcaster and writer with some of the main international museums, contemporary art galleries and biennales.

Reviews for Otherworlds: Mediterranean Lessons On Escaping History

Federico Campagna’s Otherworlds is a crucial book for the 21st Century. It’s a book about Mediterranean togetherness as its own reality system, through which we can understand existence. Campagna’s system are not absolute, but always subject to change. * Hans Ulrich Obrist, Artistic Director of Serpentine, London, UK. *