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Departing from the Homeric paradigm of hospitality as a fundamental critical framework, “After Odysseus” questions what it means when one welcomes (or not) a stranger. After the Revolution, France declared itself a haven for refugees from all nations. In modern times, this hospitality pertained to many forms of migration and extended not only to foreign citizens but also to stateless people. Wars, colonization, economical upheavals, political vicissitudes, cultural transformations all contributed to challenge this ideal. Today, at the gates of Europe the dire fate of countless migrants perishing at sea echoes the crucial question of hospitality, not only for the southern nations (Greece, Italy) but also for France, as the culture that has sustained the most significant mutually influential relations with North Africa. Recalling different models of hospitality in the Western, Mediterranean, and Arab traditions, in this seminar we will examine the relationship between France, North Africa, and the Mediterranean at large, while challenging its common definitions (to reconsider the North-South dynamics, for instance). Using literature and philosophy, linguistics and the visual arts from canonical to popular culture, we will ponder the notions of cosmopolitanism and borders, address issues of colonization, immigration and citizenship, and language and its discontents, with “literature” as the ultimate ethos for both exclusion and togetherness.