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Introduction
First published in 1996, Alessandro Baricco's novel, Seta [English translation Silk 1997] is something of a rarity in Italian letters-a "#1 international bestseller," as the English language edition trumpets on the cover. It's not hard to see some of the reasons for its success: Baricco's prose is as tightly, beautifully sparse and controlled as Calvino's, but more lyrical; also like Calvino, Baricco uses the fantastic (several reviews mention Seta's "fairy-tale" atmosphere) to great effect; and perhaps most importantly for its popular success, the novel is erotically charged from the title onward. That eroticism is only magnified by the book's 'exotic' setting: Herve Joncour, the protagonist, travels from Lavilledieu in France to Bavaria, Kiev, Lake Baikal, the Chinese border, and finally to Sabirk, whence "una nave di contrabbandieri olandesi ... to porto a ... Giappone"1 [a Dutch smugglers' ship took him to ... Japan], where much of the novel's dramatic action is set. Joncour is abroad plying his trade, the purchase of silkworm eggs, since the European eggs have been afflicted by a strange disease, pebrine, and the inhabitants of the village of Lavilledieu-not to mention Joncour and his wife-depend on the silk crop for their survival. When he arrives in Japan to bargain for illicit, healthy eggs (at the time, the export of silkworm eggs was forbidden by law), however, Joncour sees something that changes his life: a girl. She appears to be the property of the local lord with whom Joncour has established trading relations, the powerful Hara Kei, and so Joncour's immediate love for her is, like the silkworm eggs, forbidden by law, illicit.
So might begin a story whose outlines are generally familiar to most readers: the European male traveler goes abroad to the mysterious Orient, and there discovers his exotic, erotic Other. Their impossible love (impossible because it is forbidden by the stereotypically inscrutable, cruel Hara Kei; impossible because of the immense distance that separates the lovers; impossible because they do not speak the same language), although very romantic, endangers the protagonist's 'domestic' identity: he might be tempted to "go native," to leave his wife, Helene, or he might return to a Lavilledieu or an Helene changed beyond recognition. The danger looms, the Other threatens to erupt into our safe...