Persistences and Metamorphoses. Narrative Forms and the History of Ideas in Comparative Literature.

This post-doctoral position falls within the fields of comparative literature and the history of ideas, with a focus on Italian, English, and French literatures. The research activities will examine the persistence and metamorphosis of narrative structures, archetypes, motifs, and cultural paradigms, tracing their shifts across different historical contexts, genres, and media. Within this framework, the research will investigate the narrative configuration of the experience of the world and of time—both sacred and profane—by linking the concept of wonder and the journey of discovery and exploration to the evolution of ideas regarding time and memory, as well as to the ways in which characters are constructed. Particular attention will be given to biblical temporality and the category of the "figure" (*figura*), as well as to minor or non-existent characters and their reappearance and transformation through processes of rewriting.