Wanted: Byzantium. The Desire for a Lost Empire.

What is Byzantium? The question is not easy to answer. Is it a place, a time, an idea? Is Byzantium a closed chapter in history books or can it be part of modern Europe? Is it irretrievably lost, a kind of Arcadia – a topos rather than a reality, a nebulous yardstick against which we can measure our dreams and nightmares, a fairytale beyond time and space? Can we actually sail there, or may we only be distant spectators? There has long been a desire and a need for Byzantiu