B UL L ET IN of the Modern Greek

Studies Program, Dept. of Classics,

UTniversity of Toronto.

CONT'ENTSi

Pages

1. Editorial and Lists of Activities 1-10

2. Event at University College &

Photos of U.C. 10-11

3. Poems in Translation Passim

4. Lectures at the Dept. of Classics 14

5. An English Letter to Seferis 15-17

6. Two Paintings of M. Keramidopoulos 26-27

7. Article: "Prospects and Promenades:

Pausanias, Lacarri'ere & Levi as

Travelers" 28-37

8. Original Poems 40-42 &

48-49

9. Poetry Reading. Photos 43

10. Review of A. Papadiamantis, Tales

from a Greek Island 53-56

THIS ISSUE (bearing the, hopefully, lucky

odd number ELEVEN) concludes the first series of

THE AMARANTH. There are plans for greater things,

but time will decide about them. For the moment,

Iwould like to pause and thank all those who

helped with their contributions (original writings,

translations, reviews) in making the B ull e t in

progresively richer and more interesting in the seven

years of its life.

IT MAY also be worth pointing out that our

Program of Modern Greek is already fifteen years

old and that, given the limitations with which we

have had to work and the so far scanty help from the

Greek Community of Toronto, much has been accomplish-

ed. There will be another occasion to assess teach-

ing and the scholarly work which has issued from

our needs and interests. The lists which follow

reflect activities and events which have been either

organized or shared by us and which fall under the

category COMMUNITY SERVICE, broadly speaking:

2

UNIVERSITY & COMMUNITY FUNCTIONS WHERE PROF. G.THANIEL SPOKE BY INVITATION:

"On the Modern Greek Program, University of To-ronto. Beginnings and Prospects," to the Hellen-ic-Canadian Cultural Society, in 1971.

"On the Poet George Seferis (1900-1971), NobelAward for 1963," to the Association of Greek Stu-dents, University of Toronto, in 1971.

"On the Greek National Day, March 25th," to theGreek Community of London, Ontario, in 1975.

"On the Poet Kostas Varnalis (1884-1974)," tothe Hellenic-Canadian Cultural Society, in 1975.

"On Modern Greek Culture," to the Hellenic Societyof the Ryerson Polytechnical Institute, in 1975.

"On the Writer Pantelis Prevelakis," to the Cre-tans Association "Knossos" of Toronto, in 1977.

"On Modern Greek Culture," at the "'Greek Festival"of the G. H. Locke Public Library, Toronto, in 19-78.

"On the Poet Odysseus Elytis, Nobel Award for 19-79," to the Association of Greek Students, Univer-sity of Toronto, in 1980.

"On Modern Greek Culture," for the T.V. ProgramAccess of the C.B.C., in 1980.

"On M.odern Greek Culture," to the Greek Communityof Metropolitan Toronto, in the context of theGreek Cultural Month (organized jointly by theCommunity Relations, U. of T., and the Greek Com-munity), in 1980.

"Pictures from Greece" (with slides), at the AlbertCampbell District Library, Scarborough, in 1982.

"Pictures from Greece" (with slides), at the Papeand Danforth Public Library, in the context of aphoto exhibition, in 1982.

"~On Great Women in Greek Myth and History," to theKingsway Women's Club, Toronto, 1982.

"On the Greek-Canadian Writer Nikos Kachtitsis," tothe Association of Greek Students, U. of T., in 1982.

"On the Thirtieth Anniversary of C. P. Cavafy'sDeath," to the Association of Hellenes from Egypt,in 1983.

"On Modern Greek Painting" (with slides), to theGreek Community of Metropolitan Toronto, in 1983.

"'On Cavafy and Kazantzakis" (with slides and music),to the Greek Community of Montre"al, in 1984.

"On the Greek Poets of the Diaspora (North America),"at the Fifth Symposium of Poetry, University of Pa-tra, Greece, in 1985. The same talk was given to theModern Greek Program, Dept. of Classics, Universityof Melbourne, and to the Greek Professionals Associ-ation of N. S. W., Sydney, Australia, in Dec. 1985.

"Landscape and Logos," to the National Greek Associ-ation of Writers, Athens, Greece, in 1986.

"More than Meets the Eye" (with slides), to the So-ciety for Mediterranean Studies, U. of T., in 1987.

"'On the History and Development of the Greek Lan-guage," to the Hellenic-Canadian Federation of Ont-ario, in 1987.

PAPERS PRESENTED BY PROF. G. THANIEL AT MEETINGS

& SYMPOSIA.

"George Seferis'Thrush: A Modern 'Descent'," at the

Colloquium "Work-in-Progress" of the Modern Greek

Studies Association of America, at Poros, Greece,

in 1973. The paper was also read to the University

College-Trinity Classics Club, U. of T., in 1974.

"Solomos and Language," at the annual joint semi-

nar of the M. L. A. and M. G. S. A., New York, in

1974.

"George Seferis' Thrush and T. S. Eliot's Four

Quartets," at the annual meeting of the Canadian

Comparative Literature Association, at the U. of

T., in 1974.

"The View of the Classical World in Seferis' Doki-

mes," at the Modern Greek Seminar Series, Modern

Greek Program, Dept. of Classics, McGill Universi-

ty, in 1976. An updated version of the same paper

was read to the Modern Greek Program, Dept. of

Classics, University of Melbourne, Australia, in

1985.

"On Language and the Modern Greek Program, U. of T.,

at the First International Conference of University

Teachers of Modern Greek, University of Thessaloni-

ki, in 1976.

"Greek Romanticism," at the Colloquium on Romanti-

cism in a Mediterranean Context, Society for Medi-

terranean Studies, U. of T., 1981.

"The Novels of Nikos Gabriel Pentzikis," at the an-

nual Seminar of the Modern Greek Studies Association

of America, New York, 1981.

"The Work of Nikos Gabriel Pentzikis," to the Gradu-

ate Students of the School of Hellenic and Roman

Studies, University of Birmingham, England, in 1982.

"Byron and the Greek Revolution," at the Fifth Uni-versity College Symposium, Revolution and Romanti-cism (1776-1848), U. of T., in 1983.

"The Prefaces of Nikos Kachtitsis," at the annualmeeting of the Canadian Comparative Literature As-sociation, University of British Columbia, Vancou-ver, in 1983.

"Peace--an Ambiguous Word. Peace in Literature andArt," at the Seventh University College Symposium,Peace, U. of T., in 1985. The same das given tothe Parnassos Cultural Society of Ottawa, in 1985.

"Seferis, Durrell, and the Sea of Greece," at theInternational Symposium Greece, Greeks and the Seaof the Modern Greek Studies Association of America,in Providence, Rhode Island, U. S. A., in 1987.

EVENTS WHICH OUR PROGRAM OF MODERN GREEK INITI-

ATED, SPONSORED, OR SHARED WITH OTHERS:·

"Greek Cultural Evening" (A. Mastoras reads his

poetry; J. Pantazis speaks on C.P.Cavafy; G. Tha-

niel presents his one-act play O Kyr Antonis; mu-

sic and song), to the Association of Greek Stu-

dents, U. of T., in 1973.

"The Poet Kostis Palamas," a talk by Prof. G.

Georgiadis, Dept. of Philosophy, McMaster Uni-

versity, to the Hellenic-Canadian Cultural So-

ciety, in 1973.

"Atlantis," a talk (with slides) on Santoriniby Prof. E.S.Phinney, Dept. of Classics, Uni-versity of Massachusetts at Amherst, to the Hel-lenic-Canadian Cultural Society, in 1974.

"Bilingual Poetry Reading" (B.P. Nichol reads fromhis work in English and A. Mlastoras reads fromhis in Greek), to the students of the N~odernGreek Program and the public, Hart House, U. ofT., in 1974.

"Yannis Ritsos," a talk by the writer GwendolynMacEwen (on MacEwen's and N. Tsingos' translati-ons from Ritsos), to the students of the ModernGreek Program and the public, Hart House, U. ofT., in 1977.

"The Concept of the Tragic in Kazantzakis andCavafy," a talk by Prof. J.P.Anton, Dept. ofPhilosophy, Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia,to the University College-Trinity Classics Club,University College, in 1977.

"Higher Education in Greece," a talk by Prof.K. Vavouskos, University of Thessaloniki, tothe students of the Modern Greek Program and

the public, Hart House, U. of T., in 1979.

"Underwater Archaeology in Greece," a talk byProf. N. Stavrolakes, Dept. of Classics, QueensCollege, City University of New York, to the

students and the public (part of the "Greek Cul-tural Month"), U. of T., in 1980.

"The Greek Immigrant in Canada," a talk by Prof.P. Chimbos, Dept. of Sociology, Brescia College,University of Western Ontario (part of the "GreekCultural Month"~), U. of T., in 1980.

"Sharing through Poetry: a Multicultural Experi-ence" (organized by the Community Relations, U.of T.). We were responsible for the Greek part,with poets A. Yerou and G. Stubos. To the stu-dents and the public, U. of T.

Triptych of lectures (in cooperation with theGreek Community of Metropolitan Toronto): "Odys-seus Elytis," by the Greek writer Th. Frangopou-los, FulbrigJht Scholar; "John Koutsoheras, poetand Politician," by G. Thaniel and J. Gafanis;"Urban Planning in Toronto," by J. Christou (ofthe staff of Scarborough City Hall), at the Hel-lenic-Cultural Center and Hart House, U. of T.,in 1980.

"International Authors Festival," at Harborfront,Toronto. We assisted the Greek poet Ilias Simo-poulos with his reading. In 1980.

"Evangelos Papanoutsos, Pedagogue and Philosoph-er," by Prof. J.P.Anton (see above), to the stu-dents and the public, at the Cafe Lyra, Toronto,in 1981.

8i-c

"Vergil and the Mediterranean," by Prof. A. G.McKay, Dept. of Classics, MacMaster University,to the Society for Mediterranean Studies, U.of T., in 1982.

"Alexander the Great and the Greek Shadow Thea-ter," by Prof. E. S. Phinney, University ofMassachusetts at Amherst, to the Society forMediterranean Studies, in 1983.

"Alexanider "Re-Searched'," by Prof. J. W. Cole,Dept. of Classics, U. of T., to the Society forMediterranean Studies, U. of T., in 1983.

"Poetry Reading," by Katerina Angelaki-Rooke, tothe students of the Modern Greek Program and thepublic, Hart House, U. of T., in 1983.

Reception in honor of the Greek Consul-Generalin Toronto, Mr. J. Thomoglou and the Greek edu-cators, Mr. P. Tsangarakis and Mr. J. Yfanto-poulos, Hart House, U. of T., in 1984.

"Poetry Reading," by Gwendolyn MacEwen (writerin residence, 1986-1987, at U. of T.), to thestudents of the Modern Greek Program, HartHouse, U. of T., in 1986.

"Lord Byron in Greek Drama," by Prof. M. B. Ra-izis, University of Athens, to the students ofthe Modern Greek Program, University College, U.of T., in 1987.

"George Seferis and History," by Prof. M. B. Ra-izis, to the Hellenic-Canadian Federation of Ont-ario, Hellenic Home for the Aged, Toronto, in1987.

"The Ulysses Syndrome" (with slides), by Mr. IanVorres, Vorres Museum of Contemporary Greek Art,Greece, to the Society for Mediterranean stu-dies, U. of T., in 1987.

VARIA ~~e

Prof. G. Thaniel has represented, with others,

the Greek Community of Toronto at the 1972 Ontario

Heritage Congress/ appeared several times on Greek

TV programs in order to publicize events at the U-

niversity and speak on educational and cultural mat-

ters/ helped various people and agencies with trans-

lations of documents/ compiled a short list of books

suitable for Greek-Canadian communities/ advised

school teachers of modern Greek and those involved

with the Ontario Heritage Language Program/ publish-

ed articles and reviews on interest to Greek-Canadi-

ans in the Toronto Hellenophone press/ written a

concise history of Thessaloniki for one of the To-

ronto International Caravans/ given poetry readings

in the relevant series of readings at University Col-

lege/ exhibited photos from Greece and other count-

ries three times at the U. of T. Library and one of

the Toronto Public Libraries/ helped with an essay

contest with high-school students (sponsored by the

Consul General of Greece in Toronto) on Alexander

the Great/ helped students of modern Greek to take

part in the annual language contest of the American

Classical League and supervised the awarding of rib-

bons and certificates to the winners/ evaluated the

Greek translation of the booklet The Constitution

and You for the Federal Government of Canada/ evalu-

ated and corrected a project of readings and exerci-

ses in modern Greek by the teachers of the Greek

Community/ provided a brief evaluation of Greek Ra-

dio and TV Programs for the Hellenic-Canadian Fede-

ration of Ontario.

With the help of the Dept. of Classics, home

of the Modern Greek Program, and the Dept. of Pri-

vate Funding, U. of T., Prof. Thaniel established

in 1976 the U. of T. Modern Greek Trust Fund and

:.aised from sources mostly in Greece a certain a-

mnount of money on behalf of the Modern Greek Pro-

gram which helped enlarge the Modern Greek Colle-

ction on books at the U. of T. Library, paid for

10

the acquisition of teaching aids, the productionof a collection of slides and recordings for teach-ing purposes, covered expenses of a number of cul-tural functions and the publication of the Program' sbulletin The Amaranth. The Fund is now nearly ex-hausted and needs new "blood".

EVENT AT 44, UNIVERSITY

C L LEGE

1987 Teetzel Lectures

DO()UGL AS R~ICH~ARDSON)

A Not Unisighitly Buildiing:University CollegSe ini thie Ninieteenlth Cenitury

27Otbe 97Blanik D)espair: P>lnningii thec Uniivelrsity~ Biiliings2 tbe197Thie Glory of T'oronito: ConistructingC Un~ive·rsity C·(ollegeic20 ctbe 187Dire D>isaster Overcomie: Renei~w·ing U.C.

U N IV ERS, jIT1'Y C

Spri-ng 1987

North Side of the Quadrangle

From the West

12

ONE POEM by Frank W. Watt, It's over. It's Begin-

ning (Te'AoS. ApXn'). Erin, Ont.: Porcupine's Quill,

1986.

Trans. G. Thaniel

@@@@@@

@@@@

C u v o AL uxi lo pl T OpL~ o U P o U a v -

Tux o 'E p w r

ECzIES "xa'vTa"

aE bGEwa~~ TO XCV

oon 60a ndouL XyLa 68poJa m xi

L6piovTag Tug auroxperopieS

Ing EAAaGaS xxL Ing Pm'png

uEpbukeovTag Tny ouppLxvouyeyn

UGp6YELo equipa.

Apyo'TEpa, dMay oL CAXt'bes you

yu'pLouv o'appLoXoAeg

xtu'quya OTLS MUXOGv

yLa vt EgoSUErspiOn Tov xtupo'

nou wordoo advra (EgEdYcE

myv Evrixurn Wpa.

TWpa oL ayquBoAdeS you

yu'vovraL po'BoL

phas mHa 6E YUPdaugÇ

piumS you nai5eL n pvn'n you

axAnpa' waLXvd6La. 1

00 ahXes

ye Ta uaxpLa' TouS ~pup~aToxtu To ybou'voLXTG XELhD

xivra cou UoLigouv AdYO, E~lY GA SLa

pa (£po KWaS in ECvab EYW

13

aurds Rou Kive Tou aodYYout YLa AiyoTa TuppavLagiva TouS UEAn.

HES yOU RWS 6EV CqUYCES yb EdvTG--6 form xL WS To TGXoS Inc LoropiQS.As YiVEraL Vû AEGScog Tdoo woAd.CE. XpeLdroyabl E6W xtuL TipC.-

*F. W. Watt is a professor of English at UniversityCollege, University of Toronto. He has publishedscholarly books and articles on literature (British,American, Canadian) as well·as short stories and

poem. I's Oer. It's beginningl with.itsJanus-like title, i i is oko oty

4%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

Grille of a balcony from Lesbos. Drawingby V. Petrakos

14

LECTURES & SEMINARS organized by the Departmentof Classics during the Fall Term of 1987:

September 25 Professor C.P.Jones, GREEK DRAMAIN THE ROMAN EMPIRE.

October 16 Professor J.M.Rist, ARISTOTLE &PLOTINUS ON GOD & THE GOOD.

October 30 Professor J.Russell (Universityof British Columbia), THE EXCAVATION OF AJEWISH VILLAGE IN UPPER GALILEE.

November 10 Professor M.D.Reeve (CambridgeUniversity), BIRTH OF AN IDEA.

November 26 Professor H.Cotton (Hebrew Univer-sity, Jerusalem), MASADA: THE JEWS' LASTSTRONGHOLD IN THE LIGHT OF NEWLY FOUND DO-CUMENTS .

December 11 Professor E.Csapo, THE HO.STAGESCENE IN THE TELEPHUS OF AESCHYLUS & EURIPIDES.

ALSO: "E DI TIrNG G R EE K & LA TI NT E XT S"

6-7 November 1987G.P.Goold (Yale University), ON EDITING PROPERTIUS.

A.T.Grafton (Princeton University), EDITING SCIENTI-FIC NEO-LATIN TEXTS.

W.J.Slater (McMaster University), THE INTERFERENCEOF GRAMMARIANS IN THE ANCIENT TEXTS OF PINDAR& ARISTOPHANES.

R.J.Tarrant (Harvard University), THE READER ASAUTHOR: COLLABORATIVE INTERPOLATION IN LATINPOETRY.

J.Whittaker (Memorial University), THE VALUE OF IN-DIRECT TRANSMISSION IN THE ESTABLISHMENT OFGREEK PHILOSOPHICAL TEXT.S.

15j~

AN ENGLISH LETTER TO GEORGE SEFERIS

On January 21, 1952, The Times of London announcedthe death of Lieutenant-Colonel Francis GilbertMacaskie, N.C., The Times Correspondent in Greecesince March, 1947, in a London hospital. Macaskiewas 39. He had studied law in Oxford and, when theSecond World War broke out in 1939, he was com-missioned into the army and saw service in Egyptand later in Greece, He was wounded in the battleof Crete, was captured but escaped and hid in A-thens where he worked with the Greek resistancemovement. Later, he was captured by Italian troopsin the island of Tzia and sentenced to death, butthe sentence was commuted to one of life imprison-ment. In 1943, at the time of the Italian surrender,he again escaped, continued his underground work,and was hidden, during a time, by the ArchbishopDasmakinos in his own house. After liberation, hewas employed on the staff of the British Embassy atAthens and when the Archbishop became the Regent,Macaskie became a liaison officer between him andthe British Ambassador. He developed a great know-ledge of and deep affection for Greece and itspeople, and his dispatches on Greece to The Timeswere admired by many. When the dispute of Britainwith Egypt began in 1951, Macaskie was sent as Spe-cial Correspondent to Egypt, was taken ill, whilethere, and flown back to Britain.

A few months before his death, Macaskie wrote aletter to George Seferis, while the latter wasserving as Counsellor to the Greek Embassy in Lon-don. This letter, which I am publishing below with

the permission of Mrs. Maro Seferis, testifies tothe warm relationship between the two men.

The letter was sent from Primrose Ville, Horsforth,NR. Leeds, and was dated July 18, 1951.

16R

My dear George,

Please forgive this use of the machine.* Unfor-tunately my right shoulder is still under repairand only its digits are in full use.

What a joy it was to hear your voice this mor-ning. Thank you for your concern and that vital dif-ference between the fellow who intends to telephoneor write a letter and never does so -- 1 am includedin that school-- and the chap who uses the means ofcommunication as their inventors meant them to beused. I believe that you belong to my own school oflethargy -- or whatever you like to call it-- andthat is why I am grateful for your telephone call:it required an effort.

With many family difficulties to sort out whileIam at home, I do not propose to go southwards un-

til the last possible moment. I shall have to be inThe Times' office in mid-August for a day or so,preparatory for leaving for the 'patrida'** onceagain.

While in London Itrust that we shall see muchof each other.

Do you remember two occasions which I associatewith you so closely? The one when we were walkingalong Piccadily and out of the kindness of yourheart you bought me a sword-stick -- which you couldill-afford, I am sure. The other memorable time was

when we had the 'petit dfner intime' with Marinaat the Ritz in Paris. It was apt that she shouldgive you my telephone number. Kiss her on my behalfand accept through her, failing my presence, everygood wish in the world.

Yours ever,

Frank Macaskie

17

*The letter is typewritten.

**Greek for 'fatherland.'

Almost two weeks after Macaskie's death, on Febru-ary 1, 1952, The Times carried an obituary of the"Friend of Greece" by Saferis, who reminisced a-bout their times together and praised the man forhis boldness and kindness. "I once asked him," Se-feris wrote," what was his most~ difficult momentof the war. 'When I was dropped once by parachute,'he replied laughing. 'That feeling of being suspen-ded in mid-air, not knowing what you will find onthe ground!' I had expected him to refer to the mo-ment when an Italian military Court had sentencedhim to death (...)."

-- G. Thaniel

18

A NEW POEM by Y. Chouliaras.* F

Trans. G. Thaniel

K e y o f S ocra te s

Co one doubts me iwhile they wait(am I delaying you?)for me to drink the hemlock coollywithout fear or even the slightest indecision.

During such momentsirony becomes insufferable.

Then, sorrow for the lossand, certainly, -the admiration of centuries.

My judges toowould rather be able to saythat they contributed something Ato such a famous injustice

would like to drawlessons of consistencyall are merely concernedthat I might disappoint them.

Some disciple of mine already summarizesthe trial's proceedingsensuring his own immortalityalong with minebased on my unsurpassable Socratic method.

Even those destined to remain knownsimply as my precursorsrun after me in dreamsurging me not to linger any longerbut put an end to their timelocking up and throwing the keyhigh in the air.

19

But who will catch itbefore it rolls down and vanishesin the blood-stained trap of lifeout of which the one-armed midwifepulls the newly bornholding it from its two feet.

If it's her job to tryand catch in the airthe key

she'll drop one of the two, I think.

%%ooooogg"*Y. Chouliaras is the author of I Alli Ghlossa(The other language). Athens: Ipsilon, 1981. Twopoems of his have been discussed in G. Thaniel,"I Piites tis Dhiasporas (Voria Ameriki)" [TIhepoets of the ltreekI diaspora (North America)1,Proceedings of the Fifth Symposium of Poetry (1985).Athens: Ghnossi, 1986.

20 ~ ss~t;,;,,9

TWO POEMS by D. Houliarakis, I Superga Perimeni

(Superga is waiting).* Athens: Kaviros, 1987.

Trans. G. Th4niel

S uper ga Is Wai t ing

The soccer players of our youthare fading into the general indifferencethey vanish while going to jointheir friends waiting for them on Supergathe aviators are lost in their planes --their faces show wonder for just an instant

prior to the crash--our friends and relatives disappearsail off to secret harborsalas! we also vanish silentlyremembering our gloriousand bright dayswith tears.

%%ooooooo%The Dakotas

How smoothly the Dakotastake off from Hasani**their wings look like bodiesadorned during obscure after-dinners.

When the last passenger falls asleepwhen Cithaeron emarges tall,color of ash, in the backgroundtheir engines suddenly wake upthe harpies.

*Collina di Superga is a hill near Torino. A planecarrying the cityls soccer team crashed on the slo-

pe of this hill in 1949. All 31 passengers died.

**Hasani is an airport in Greece.

21

THREE POEMS by N. B. Ladas, Astrovati (He treadson Stars). Athens: Plethron, 1986.*

Trans. G. Kirikopoulos

[St e ps b y t he S e as hor e...}

Steps by the seashoreturn silence into a giantand a maistros** plays aroundastride old rowing boats. (9.Vl.1972)

(T here Was a Hil 1 Co veredw i th P i ne s...f

There was a hill covered with pinesand at the top an ethereal chapelof an affectionate blue look such as thingsassume after conversing with the sky for years.There, every evening you would ask the pineneedles and the grey stoneswhy you should love me so much, whymy arms should bring you such vibrationsof happiness.And then, locked in .each other's embracewe would look at the moon emergingfrom behind the mountain not too far offfloodin9 with light some tree of the hilltop.And time would roll alongsilvery, serene and silent amidst the sighsof the nightand life held no secrets for ussince it was itself a boundless secretspreading sincere roots in our bosomsa mask sprinkled with stardust.Then words lost their strengthand we smiled communing with the bigpines and the small glow-wormsthrough our heartbeat and our excited bodies

22

listenin9 to the quiet breathing of the birdsof lovealone happy, two grains of sandon the bank of almighty death. (22.Vli.1972)

[I nt erp re t at io n/ (from a letter ofa poet to a friend)

First I .drew a circleand then a triangle within the circlea straight line nextacross the circleand the triangle in the circle.Then I crossed out this designwith a big X, lit a cigarette 4and started arranging the versesone after the other.And if all this seems odd to you,don't blame me. This much Ican tell you.Besides, I am ignorant of "conceptions"of meaningsof style and the esthetic values of the work,things that keep critics busy.Address yourself to them. I merelywrite poems, write in order to...in order to...the devil knows why I write.Still I'm glad that my poemmade an impression on you. (19.ill.1973)

*N. B. Ladas took his own life in 1979, at the

age of 26. In 1974 he published a book of poemswhich showed great promise. After his death,writings he had left behind were published byhis parents and his friends. The three poemsprinted here in translation come from a bookedited and introduced by the poet Y, Patilis.

**The north-west wind (Italian vento maestro)

~\~~/, ~ ______23

THREE POEMS by S. Trivizas, Vios Asomaton (Lifeof the bodiless). Athens: lakynthos, 1986.

Trans. G. Thaniel

(I)

The days are short the nights like seashellsmy sky is white with shadows and strange stars.Wakeful hours inside the silencea moment flashes when the centuries bendwords come bright with lovewhite voices, gestures of sleepa shiny moon in the skyleaning down

to mock the darkness.

(II)

Mal di luna*

The moon shone all ni9htlike a red hot tooth.

With the darkness, the windand the black cloud

between the legs.

*Moonache.

Each an Drams i~Oth isDetEach man dreams with his death.

I've retained a little of your breathand the mute furrow of your lipsbut you have no face, no bodyevery evening you grow less like a wordthat cracked the wind without return.

24

Here each man lives his own death

every day hiding his handsevery night with musicand darkness.

But I met you in the light, years agoIhave known your voice and your smile

gleaming amidst words in smoke.

Then you entered the vein.

TWO POEMS by D. Konidharis, O Ilios Hamiloni (Thesun is growing faint). Athens: lakynthos, 1987.

Trans. G. Thaniel

The Sun is Growing Faint

Iam in a hurryto have my picture taken.The sun is growing faintandImust findthe photographerto have my picture taken

in a voluptuous profileof my flesh.

Apartment House

Those that have been mobilizedin the apartment housewhich gnaws at our very boneswish againfor the arrivalof heavy nightand of generoussleep.

25

Now I truly desirekissesand a breath of benignwind

in full viewof caresses and love

(it should come ·through the open windowwherewill be shiningthe curlof acluster of leaves).

With a little daringI '11 shed my dependence

and my grand participationin the maintainanceof the apartment house

which keeps floatingin full sailtowards shipwreck.

26

T p

Lawrence Park Ravine - Charcoal. 111/2 x

171/2 inches - 1969.

THE ARTIST, Mary Keramidopoulos-Nastis was bornand raised in Ontario; studied at Lawrence ParkCollegiate Institute, and then at the Universityof Toronto (Fine Arts, French, Modern Greek). Shealso took courses in Brittany, France, and inSherbrooke, Quebec. In her painting and drawingshe found inspiration in Greek and French art aswell as from her contemplation of nature. Sheworks with soft pencil and in charcoal and water-color. Her use of color is sensitive, impression-istic. In searching for ways to express the deli-

27

cate nuances of light, she often combines mediasuch as watercolor and ink or charcoal, penciland pastel.

Mary has had both solo and group exhibitions inToronto and Regina through the 70's; also, inOttawa, London and Kingston, in 1984-85; in Athens,Greece, in 1985. She was also commissioned to paintmurals for the Greek community center in Toronto.

For the last twelve years, Mary has worked as ateacher of French and Art for the Toronto Boardof Education, while painting and trying to raisea family.

Tropical Flowers - Pencil. 8 /4x11 /4 inches -1979.

28

PROSPECTS & PROMENADES: PAUSANIAS, LACARRIERE &;

LEVI AS T.RAVELERS

@@@@@@@@@@@@@@

The late 1960's and following were a hippy-inspired era when it became popular with Americanstudents and intellectuals -- whether they werestereotypical Xu'nnies or not -- to walk with a back-pack all over Europe, searching for the reality oftheir cultural ancestors. This kind of backpackingwalk had already become a tradition among Europeanintellectuals, as can attest any twentieth-centuryvisitor to Greece who has met an earnest, straw-hatted German, French, or English student sittingamong the pines of the remotest site, studying hisguide book and balancing a large map on his knee.To many Americans, especially those who were notformal students or scholars of the Classics, theGreek walk of the 1970's was largely a fad, under-taken usually in the heat of August (it took a whileto cross Europe, even with a Eurail pass), when anyfocussed intellectual activity could frequently beforced by the blistering sun to dissolve itself indaily, gloriously refreshing swims in the cool Aegean.The European tradition of culturally-motivated, back-packing walks, however, had always been a more seriouscultural exercise. Not surprisingly, it has given usthe written records of two very sensitive walkers ofthe 1970's, Jacques Lacarribre, in Promenades dansla Grece Antique (Paris: Hachette 1978), and PeterLevi, The Hill of Kronos (London: W. Collins Sons 1980;reprinted by London: Arrow Books Ltd. 1983).2

These two records, one in French, the other inEnglish, are similar in that both authors used thesecond-century A.D. Lydian-born traveler Pausaniasas their guide to the antiquities of Greece, lettinghim set the itinerary and often the questions which

~L~>fs- -- 29

they attempt to answer. Both authors, moreover, knewPausanias' HEpLIYnoug intimately, because they hadboth translated it. Both authors, like Pausanias,usually walked to the sites they visited; unlike Pau-sanias, however, they often walked because they want-ed to, not because they had to. Accordingly, beingwalkers by choice, they sometimes had the leisure toenjoy their walks rather more than did Pausanias, andit is ironic that both these inexhaustible, leisurelymodern travelers can be puzzled when Pausanias, travel-ing in a harsher age, describes (incorrectly) what hehas not visited, as at Sounion, or does not describea vista of breath-taking beauty, as at Sicyon, whichthey are certain he must have seen and should nothave failed to be impressed by.

Pausanias believed that the temple at Sounion wasAthena's, though in reality it was Poseidon's. Levicomments, critically, "Probably he never landed there;it was a remote spot, and infested with pirates" (101-102). The temple of Athena, it seems, had once beenat Sounion, but by Pausanias' time, had been moved,block by block, to Athens for safety and re-erected(118) there, where, alas, Pausanias did not see iteither, or he might have corrected his "Hie." Sounion,adds Levi, "was very likely dangerous, and perhaps thatwas why the temple was moved" (118-119).

Lacarribre describes what was evidently for himthe most beautiful landscape he saw in Greece, in thevalley of the Asopus river, on Pausanias' route toSicyon. "The bed of the river was dry and tongues ofsand snaked through the middle of a luxuriant tangleof cypress, yew, rock-rose, and rhododendron, amid adeafening murmur of insects and marshy, warm fragran-ces" (13). And Lacarribre reflects, "Pausanias himselfmust have seen, inhaled, appreciated these too" (Ibid.),but, peculiarly f·or LacarriAre, did not describe themin his HepLdynoug.

Much could be said about the similarities and dif-ferences between the old and these modern Pausaniases,but I would like to describe here what I detect is an

30

underlying disappointment which both the modern Pau-saniases have in the old one, and what is more signi-ficant, a more deeply underlying disappointment whichboth men have in the remains of Classical civilization.

The disappointment in Pausanias is inevitable, weshould realize, because he saw so much more than dohis heirs. As Levi says, somewhat sadly, Pausaniassaw "the antiquities of nearly all Greece in a farbetter condition than anyone has done since" (118),whereas Lacarrikre falls into an elegiac tone, remind-ing us that Pausanias wrote "after the Roman invasionand just before the destruction by Christians and bar-barians. Pausanias does not appear only as an informedtraveler, but above all as a man, a passionate, scru-pulous, careful witness of Greece in her final hours"(15). Ignoring the rhetoric about the "final hours"of Greece, which, fortunately, is still very muchwith us, we can deduce from these sentences the fru-stration which Lacarriere feels with not only Pausa-nias' guide to antiquities now lost, but also withthe surprisingly (but, also, frequently) paired vil-lains of Classical history, Christians and barbarians.Levi and Lacarriere, however, committed as they areprofessionally to admiring Pausanias and even sellinghim in translation to other tourists, mask their fru-stration by claiming to find benefits other than theobvious one of touristic guidance. Lacarriere, forexample, assures us that Pausanias' enumerations oflost antiquities, e.g. the lists of "rites, statues,ex voto's, altars, and buildings" at Olympia, asidefrom their usefulness to research archaeologists, in-troduce us all to the daily life and service of thesanctuary (187). We note, however, that Lacarri'eredoes not include translations of most of these longlists in his Promenades, and Lacarribre's strongestjustification for using Pausanias as a guide is notthe indubitable socio-historical knowledge they pre-serve but rather the excuse many of the Classicalsites described by Pausanias provide for enjoying a

walk in the wild. "I owe my most beautiful walks toPausanias," confides Lacarriere, "in search of [the]forgotten places [he mentionsl, buried among thewild flowers (enfouis sous les herbes folles) (13).This would seem to be making virtue of necessity, i.e.using the tangled, but naturally polychromed vista ofa lost sanctuary as the primary goal for visiting it.This would also seem a dangerous tack for translatorsof Pausanias to take, as the cynical reader could ar-gue that if only the beauty of the wild flowers mat-ters, the tourist would best simply follow his eyes,or if he is French like Lacarriere, perhaps his nose(Lcf. "de senteurs mar£cageuses et chaudes" (13)17j.

Levi faces the same irony of situation, justifyingand even trying to appreciate a detailed guide to mis-sing antiquities, as does Lacarriere, but Levi's re-

sponse is subtler, himself being a far more complexperson and writer than Lacarriére.

First of all, when Levi visited Greece for thefirst time, in 1963, he was already disillusioned withthe standard Classicists' image of Greece. His educat-ion had been the long, and to him tedious one of aJesuit priest, in gloomy northern Oxfordshire besides.It had "included so many illnesses that the trainingitself seemed like an illness" (12-13). A kind of

superannuated student, Levi the Jesuit, by his ownadmission, "was hungry for life" (13), and his firstvisits to Greece were like a ldelayed spring, a break-

ing of the ice" (12). In short, Levi was primed toenjoy the spring flowers rather more than the marblemonuments, and thus was bound to be somewhat disappoint-ed in Pausanias' account of the cultural monuments ofGreece. Consequently, when Levi the translator of Pau-sanias explains to us that much of the exploratory re-search for his edition of Pausanias was "to find theroads Pausanias used, and the places on those roads,"we note the priorities (lost roads before identifiablesites) and tentatively deduce that for Levi, as forCavafy of "Ithaka," it was the Wpato TaEGeL'8, or love-

ly research, not the riches, or goal, of Pausanias'

32

work which mattered most to him.

Yet the truth is that Levi found that his studiesof Pausanias provided him with some of the means offulfilling his real goal, which was quite differentfrom the goal of fully understanding Pausanias. Le-vi's real goal is stated early in The Hill of Kronos,and Levi's progress in fulfilling it is chronicledthroughout the book, culminating in the last chapter,where he describes a special trip to Greece, in 1978,with his new wife and eight-year-old stepson. By then,Levi had left the Jesuit priesthood.

The real goal of Levi's search in Greece was notPausanias or even Greece, but, as he states in theIntroduction, what he was "searching for and hungryfor was reality runderlining mine?" (13). Knowledgeof reality is a very philosophical goal, but evident-ly Levi, despite his disciplined philosophical andtheological education in England, had not discoveredreality before coming to Greece. And although Levicarried Pausanias with him everywhere during his tra-vels through Greece, he naturally found that any in-formation which Pausanias might furnish on realitywas by definition limited, since many of the wonder-fully real monuments Pausanias described had longsince been destroyed or lost. Pausanias himself, Levifound a bit of a Philistine. By the time Pausaniashad reached Delphi, comments Levi, "he was old....complaining more and more about bad roads, and show-ing increasing interest in bird-watching and in thegods of healing" (51).

Levi's real guides to reality in Greece were thepoets George Seferis and Nikos Gatsos, and Levi wasforced to admit in Greece that his real professionhad never been a priest or scholar, but rather poet(11). So the poet had come to Greece on a poet's quest,drawn there not primarily by the legend of Greece, butby some contemporary Greek poets whom he had read andappreciated before arriving. Upon arrival, he was readyto win them as friends and follow them as guides, and

~j~CB~133

from the first, he saw Greece through their eyes:"The landscapes" he saw "were those of George Seferis.The countryside was that of Nikos Gatsos, 'a littlewheat for the festival, a little wine for remembrance,a little water for the dust'" (28).3 Levi visited Se-feris and his wife in their apartment behind the AthensStadium, and became a regular among Gatsos' circle ofadmirers which convened regularly at Flocca's.

In 1963, Levi, by his own admission, was more in-terested in Seferis than in Pindar, but later wouldlearn to appreciate Pindar too. On Levi's first meet-

ing with Seferis, Levi was struck immediately by the"charming playfulness, as well as the darkness andseriousness of his mind, and the sorrows of his life-time" (34). The seriousness of Seferis' outlook shaped,for example, Levi's reaction to Delphi, as it did also,for that matter, Lacarribre's. Delphi, according toLevi, is "splendid and terrible"; for "in the begin-ning," at Delphi -- says Levi, quoting Seferis in an

essay - "'was the anger of Zeus'," often expressedfrom behind the flashing cliffs above the "water-springbursting out of a split mountain" (50). Delphi, accord-

ing to Lacarribre, is a kind of stage for an ancientbut never ending struggle between light and shadow,while Seferis is summoned to corroborate, "Myth candemonstrate that the ch~thonianforces are the yeast of

light (le levain de la lumihre) and the more they inter-act, the stronger is the light they will dominate"(253).

The suffering that underlies the foundation and

on-going maintenance of Apollo's monument at Delphi,the shadow intensifying light, is but one aspect ofSeferis' vision of universal suffering as the sub-stratum of life. Of the centrality of suffering tothe real Greece, Levi was aware early, but came tounderstand it only with the passing years, particular-

ly during the infamous government of the Colonels. Le-vi was so involved, to his credit, in the resistance

against the Colonels (he hid one of the student lead-

34

ers of the Law School uprising--which preceded thebetter-known resistance of the Polytechnic School--in his apartment and dressed him in special clothesso that he could escape unnoticed from Greece) thathe was forbidden by the Colonels' government to re-enter Greece. Afterwards, in 1974, when happier daysand better government returned to Greece, he directeda documentary film for the B.B.C. which comprised in-terviews with simple, village survivors of the Colo-nels' oppression. During the making of this film,Levi "came to understand much more than JheJ haddone about suffering in Greece, more even than IThe)had learnt from social anthropologists" (190). There-after, he read a classic like Homer with a new aware-ness, an awareness of the suffering which lay unspokenbetween the lines. Just as, by analogy, true know-

ledge of water depends on an awareness of thirst, trueknowledge of a healing shrine on an awareness of theterrible power of disease, so a real knowledge of Ho-mer depends on an awareness of the depth of sufferingwhich even simple humans can experience, and have ex-perienced throughout Greece's history.(See p. 190).

Levi's comments on the sufferings of Greece, whichterrible, recent events finally made real for him, arereflections of similar comments by Seferis. Earlier,in The Hill of Kronos, Levi had commented that Seferiswas profoundly aware of the "Furies, the avenging de-mons," of Greece, which were determined to punish "aoncegoodand simple people" (126). It is this later,mature, more realistic image of Greece as a once good,and sometimes still good, and simple people oppressedby the dark forces of life and history -- nurtured bythe poet Seferis, and verified by Levi's own experi-ence during the years of the junta -- which becomesthe reality for which Levi had been seeking when hefirst came to Greece.

The Greek contrast between simple goodness andcruelty is frequently mentioned by Levi. He wonders,for example, why poets so good as his friends fromPyrgos, George Pavlopoulos and Takis Sinopoulos, couldbe "so sweet and gentle" without becoming sentimental.

35

He is pleased to note that Pavlopoulos was descendedfrom "simple heroes of the war of independence" (66).George Seferis and Nikos Gatsos are compared by Levito two "Chinese sages" sitting meditatively "underpine trees on their own mountain" (121). Yet I thinkall these poets constitute, for Levi, what he saysexpressly of Sinopoulos: a combination of intellectu-al clarity with a "passionate disturbance" (120) wel-ling up from the dark pools of the Delphic Python.

In the last chapter of The Hill of Kronos, Levidescribes a trip to Greece, in 1978, in company withhis wife and stepson. It is a trip less romantic thanthe original exploratory trip of 1963, when he tra-veled alone. For one thing, his stepson had fallen onthe marble floor of a hotel and injured his head, hiswife was unwell from the food, and he himself had araging toothache. Their urgent drive along the high-way from Volos to the dentist in Athens was broken bylittle shade, and the road itself seemed unbelievablyugly. Perhaps God had gone to Italy, gone out, say,to Venice for coffee, thought Levi's wife Deirdre.That night the family found the air of Athens "slappedwarmly against [theirJ faces like a hot flannel soakedin diesel oil" (209-210).

This was their Greek suffering for that day, butin due time, as often in Greece, all the principalsrecovered from their petty ailments. Our last viewof the family is of them eating ice cream at Flocca's,sitting with Nikos Gatsos, looking "as tranquil asKronos" (219). Kronos, torturing, tortured and pro-bably simple, and with a mountain-home at Olympiamore primitive than the splendid temple of his cleverson Zeus below. Yet Kronos' hill, covered with coolingpines, has outlasted Zeus' temple, whose lichen-coveredblocks lie strewn as though the Giants of myth hadfought a cataclysmic war there (cf. Lacarribre 176: lesfGts de base....évoquent par leur desordre quelque ca-tastrophe gigantesque"). So Gatsos, this unexpectedincarnation of Kronos, sits serene like Zeus' father

366

during the Golden Age, looking after his family, butthis time Gatsos does not sit beneath the pines ofKronos' hill at Olympia or of the mountains of Gatsos'native Arcadia, but sits happily with his adopted Bri-tish family under the sidewalk awnings of the coolestplace in downtown Athens, the fabled ice cream parlorcalled Flocca. By a brilliant series of poetic trans-formations, Peter Levi, our poet-traveler, tells usthat in the end he found reality in Greece. What wasit? Ice cream and poetry. No doubt, Pausanias wouldhave been baffled by all this!

-- Edward S. PhinneyUniversity of Massachusettsat Amherst.

%%%%%%%%%

The paper was read at the joint meeting of the Ameri-can Philological Association and the Modern Greek Stu-dies Association of America, "Travelers in Greece, An-cient and Modern," during the 119th Annual Meeting ofthe APA, in New York City, on December 28, 1987. The 2illustrations were borrowed from P. Levi, The Hill ofKronos .

All page references to The Hill of Kronos in this

37

paper are to the 1983 edition. Translations from La-carrière's Promenades dans la Grèce Antique are bythe writer.

3Verse from; Nikos Gatsos' famous poem "Amorgos."'

Ote aes eda h "Tavl rsiGeces-

Acoutse o aprly reda hTravelers in Greece," byPofer-lena Lngdn "A Groeek-Amierica's Imprressrions ofGrecEin th Etarly eign ofe Othor o t hf," by Po.Ahn oiu

"The Greec of Count Gobelsineauec," by Prof. Jae er-

treault. The seminar was coordinated by Prof. G. Tha-niel.

38

A NEW POEM by H. Roumeliotakis.* ~ E

%%%%%%%%%

Trans. G. Thaniel

@@@@@@@@@

G un Powder !We Are Lost

(A detail from the life of ChiefLykourghos Loghothetis)**

Somewhere deep in my mindstir the life and deedsof Chief Lykourghos Loghothetisas, often, my friend Alexis S.

of the Saracensused to relate them to me

in those years.

Tonight, though, I won't explorethe life and deeds of the man--these can be found in history--I'll only tell a detail, ~ Lijust one detail which, I think,can throw a bit of light

on our lives.

The enemy, they say, was besieging himfrom all directions

he had no bread no waterhis days even his hourscould be counted.

Here let me open a bracketand say that in our lifea day comeswhen we have to make d .cisionscritical for usand for others who look up to us.

Then, speeches are of no helptwo words only, a motion of the headare more becoming.

39

The time was mercilesshe counted his own people, the enemiesthe wretched springtook pencil and paper and carved (the message)

Gun powder! We are lost.

Nothing else.He signed, sealed itand handed it to a brave young Samian

****·kJto take it to Kerkiswhere his allies lay in wait.

I can imagine him 'the moment he wrote and signed the letterwith his lion heart roaringGun powder! We are lostnothing else.

Gun powder, then, my Brothers,Gun powder, and God's mercy.

(15.III.87)

%%%%%%%%%

*Three other poems by H. Roumeliotakis were printed,in translation, in The Amaranth 9 (1985).

**L. L. was a Samian chieftain of the Greek War ofIndependence of 1821.

***According to the poet, Alexis S. looks like...a Saracen. Hence the nickname.

***t*A mountain on Samos.

40

THREE POEMS by Pascal Dranitsaris*

Dear Vincent

I see you wild-eyedat your madhouse windowstraining to take it all inheart pounding, palms sweatydelirium pouring out your brush.

Your mad immortal paintingsare the essence of firethe color and perpetual motion of fire:the sky alive with shooting starsthe fields and flowerstrembling with passioneven the stolid hillsblue giants :

rippling with sineweach peasant woman "·

acherished saint "each broken twig 'filled with tragic grandeur J~3:each placid lake Ythe face of your beloved.

Sleep, unquiet heart. `In your thirty-seven yearsyou lived a hundred lifetimes.

Dedication

To the immigrants who helped build thiscontinent

whose souls are frozen in the steeland concrete of these buildingswho poured out their anguishlike the thick black asphalt of the

highwayswhose voices faintly linger in the foundrieswhose ghostly hands still twitch on factory

floors

41

who bore their humiliation and despairin silence

though the words burned like white-hotpig iron

in their bellies, though their lipsquivered and contorted trying to form them.

Their story remains untongued.May my poems be a wreath of roses.

Ka r ate Da y s

Some use the rope, razor, revolverothers use booze, pills, fast cars.I used the martial artswhere psychotic japs taught mehow to kill myself by the millimeterhow to draw it out, enjoy it.

I'd go four times a week ~lift weights, jog.I'd pound people into the mat

and they'd do the same to me.I was lean, I was perfectI was dying.

They'd tell us the idea wasnot to finish your opponentbut to blend with him.

They'd lecture us about harmony and love.

Then they'd beatthe living crap out of us.

What a band we were.A Noah's ark of losers

preserving every form ofmaladaption for posterity:alienated ethnics, obsessive jewboys,faceless orientals, blacks with haunted eyesbefuddled wasps, pathetic flower children

42

cops dreaming of eating their gunssadists, masochistsschizophrenics hearing voices in the darkall lonely, all womanlessall smothered by self-hatepeople who were broken long agoand might never be repaired.

One day I walked inand felt death dripping from the ceilingdeath seeping through the wallssmug, atomized death enteringmy bloodstream like monoxide.I felt the icewater in my veinsthe lash at my back.I felt howling rage and sorrow.I felt madness and decay.I saw the sunlight dying on the matand I got out of there.

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

Pascal Dranitsaris studied at the University ofToronto and is now working as an occupational Hy-

giene Consultant for the Ministry of Labour of Ont-ario. A recent journey to France gave him the first

poem. His North-American experience gave him the 0-ther two. P. is in the process of putting togetherhis first book of poetry.

Pascal~~~~~~~~~~ Drntai edhspotyfrteMdGreek~~~~~~~~~~ Prga nteWle om .C noo

Deebr10 97

: · · Mmia.i

Two poems by V. Kouyeas, Keghounte Hronia (Yearson fire). Athens: Poria, 1983.

Trans. G. Thaniel

Schools ofthe WorId

H8tel Saint-Sulpice, Odeon,Paris, 1978.

Waking suddenly in the darkIwanted a glass of water a newspaper

light by the bed strength and luckto break this mirrorwhich has been staring at me tearfully

for years. juradjDifficult yearsfor the heart which desires and tends

to go beyond the body's limitswith the heart's folds half-written overwith nothing finished gained clear.Dream turns into a nightmareand like acid it wears life's metal.

T he P ia no P 1 a y er (sic, in the original)

Between the piano and the seathe indifference of the sandcurrents flowing unceasingly(the roads covered by the piano playeraddresses dates).Shopping items of the 10 May 1929fossilized inside the kitchen net.Sunshine and dust.Had he been born?A car of undefinable speedconverges on the meetingbetween the piano and the seamusic fails to startthe piano player is a womanher skin is in the color of the keys

45

the bodies are dragged by the water

to the edge where the water

is mnomentarily transparent and you can seethe pebbles

then the foam has no

perspectivethe letters in a little parcela blue ribbon fading from the salt

the piano flies towards the cloudsmusic fails to startthe woman is a brunette of middle heightshe is traveling to Moscow on some train.

What would have become of me without youlittle rag

relic of love's propellera ball of flesh a dream a feather what would

have become of me

when the dark water submergesthe face the passion and the act?

Grille of a balcony from Lesbos. Drawing byV, Petrakos

THREE POEMS by C. Rizakis, O Vithos mou ta Pragh-mata (Things are my depth). Lamia: Parodhos, 1985.

Trans. G. Thaniel

Where the Axe Reaches

Every so often my ashy age chisels out momentsthat help the small shoots of bitterness

in their run towards the morrowso that yesterday's bereavement growanew leaves

so that become fresh again and do not burn

in the fire that has hemmed me in.

When the Subject Persists

Ithink of fleeing from the nightof daring to do also that sometime

but, again, how can I expose you to the abundantlight

you whom I have been preserving in the dark foryears

below veins and behind wrinklesin any case I'd be loath to betrayverses that hinted at premature screamsthat failed commercially and were buried

with me in darkness. ,7~~

Things Are my Depth

Things persist in my concern in my devotionthey look for the controlled caress the mute

attachment

my very soul has been welded into their marginsthe holy form of the soul will avert the hubris--

47

pity the things, they moan day and nightrespect the things, they drip blood they feel

pa in

if you can, love them, if you can, save them

if you can bear it, touch me nesting tenderlyin their depth.

Metriho loronto Convention Centre

A new poem, in English, by G. Thaniel.

Moo r e Ish En cou nt e rs

Now that my fifth decadepalimpsest that has held a bit of colorvanishes mutely down the horizon

Igaze through this Mooreish archat London's Kensington Gardensinto my element, waterflashing oracles in silverover the pale August afternoon.

1987

Ihave a camera in handbut it is Time, unseen photographer,that snaps me out of the corner of his eyepivoting me back a dozen yearsto that equally pale Ontario afternoonin Moore's hall of marvels in the Gallery

e~18~"v~;Bri~h49

when the candid camera of a friendcaught me before another piece of sculpturea kind of Sphinxwhose Parthian frontalityhumbled my gaze.

with it twite bon sap

I h ve see t e phix ur i nto a Mermaid.-:::::::::::

50

FIVE POEMS by Alexis Zakythinos* /~ 5

A Musical Evening

There are seats for four and I, -alone, trying tocover for the absence of the other three with myslender flute, able of course only to shake offmy own part tonight, in any case knowing that al-so tomory~gw, under the same conditions of soli-tude and with the same flute, I will execute thesame cry.

%%%%%%%

Epi graph

He, whose still warm rags were found shortly inthe middle of the road, must be going about nakedsomewhere near here, quite near.

%%%%%%%

Memento

Here where, o friend, you paused to watch thesunset, I set a mark.

%%%%"%%%

After the Rain

God said to the rain "plough well" and so thegarden was ploughed. Time for it to flower.

%%%%"%%%

In a Public Park

0 seat in the afternoon sunshine, which youshortly hosted my dream, I thank you.

-- Trans. G. Thaniel

Other translations from A. Zakythinos in "The Po-etry of Alexis Zakythinos", The Amaranth, 4 (1982)23-33, and "Alexis Zakythinos, Buoys and Stars",Greek Letters, 3 (1984-1985), 189-1999, again by

G. Thaniel.

51

THREE POEMS byA.Parthenis, from Thitia xenitias(Service of an exile). Piimata. Viv1io I. Athens.Pitsilos, 1986.

Trans. Evie Tastsoglou

E 1 Greco

Each time that we met-- for real or in dream--it was always night.(God was also born at night.)

And everywhere we came upon each other-- in Crete, Toledo, Venice--you could smell the storm in the air.(The storm: his Messiah.)

The dazed stars were fallingin a blazing skyand masts got tangled in the cloudsand dampened wings of archangels.

While something profound shuddered before usand kept rising apocalypticallylike a flame goaded upby the wind of no beginning:

something more lucid than sacrifice,something more secreti2ve than sorrow,something more precious than hope, asomething more godlike than joy!

Autumn in Cornwa 1 o

The wind strips the trees. (o avo 0

The day winds upvery early by its lamp,comes to roost in its corner.

52

Our memory and our nostalgiashuidder .The moon lurks in the cloudshiding from lovers.Stars fall into a stupor. oShores lay deserted * sand boats retire.God lets the raininvest with musicits rhythmical lanentwhen we are asleep or awake.While the mist covers uswith its mysterious veilof oblivion, escape or meditation!

J o han n S e b ast i an B ac h

(1985)

Church organs in huge cathedrals,set in motion by Your invisible fingersin Your autumn afternoons of Leipziglit by no ray of the sunbut dominated discreetly by eternity,submerge my soul into reverie,in the inexplicable thrill of exaltation,in that awe where annihilation blends with the

sublime!And You, now serene and then inexorable,fly over the heads of the justlike the law of Moses or like naturewhich will tolerate no doubt of grandeur!

53

RE VIE W

Alexandros Papadiamantis, Tales from a Greek Island.Translated, with an Introduction and Notes, by Eli-zabeth Constantinides (The Johns Hopkins UniversityPress, 1987). Pp. i-xx and 1-176. $ 16.95 U.S.

&s&6&6&&&&&&&

When the reviewer revisited, in 1984, Skisthos,the island of A. Papadiamantis, he found the houseof P. (now a museum) no longer at the edge of thetown but in its very middle surrounded by touristshops, a fast-food restaurant and the bar "Centaur"(bar, pub, or whatever you like, declared the hospi-table sign on the wall.) Would P. have deplored the-se developments? Probably, although his reactionwould have been informed with humor, the kind ofhumane and sad humor which pervades his stories andcan even survive translation, as the English rendi-tions by E. Constantinides of twelve representativestories of P. show in Tales from a Greek Island. Thesaving grace of humor and a sense of the intrinsicmystery of life, of even the restricted and humblelife of a small seaport town on a small Greek islandof the Aegean, are, beyond plots and characterization,what raises P. above the status of a mere ethographosor realist, and what must have ingratiated him on thesensibilities of diametrically different writers, likethe sublime Elytis, writer of a long essay on P. withthe characteristic title The Magic of Papadiamantis(a brief excerpt from that essay is printed on thedust jacket of the present book), and the brutallydown-to-earth Varnalis.

It is not the first time that P. has "sailed" toNorth America. We find his story "I Nostalgos" (Shethat was homesick) in a collection of modern Greekstories in translation by A. Phoutrides and D. Vaka,published in 1920. Other stories of P. have appearedin translation in the magazine Athene, 14, 3 (1953)

54

and the journal The Charioteer, 1, 4 (1962); also, inP. Gianos, Introduction to Modern Greek Literature.An Anthology of Drama, Fiction and Poetry (1969). P.'sfamous psychographic novella I Fonissa (The murderess)is also available in English in two different trans-lations, by G. Xanthopoulides (1977) and P. Levi (1983).I quote these data here from a sense of justice tothose previous translators and because they do not ap-pear in Tales. There has been at least one North Ameri-can nostalgos of the writing style of P. judging from"To Paska tou Metanasti" (The Easter of the immigrant),a Greek story openly proferred as a story in the styleof P. by its author Ilias Koutsis, in the Argonaut, anannual volume of texts on Greek-American intellectuallife, published in New York (1959).6 But this is thefirst time that we have, in Tales, a representative se-lection of P.'s stories in very good translations andwith a competent introduction and notes.

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In her Introduction, Professor Constantinidespoints out P.'s almost complete identification withhis native island Skiathos. P.'s essential realismis not lacking in mythical and symbolic overtones,reflections of his education and special interests.P. was a priest's son and always had a deep, mysticalfeeling for Greek Orthodoxy, its tenets and its ritu-als. The religious aspects of the island life receive,therefore, privileged treatment in his stories. He was,on the whole, conservative and sceptical about the pos-sibility of man to better himself through social pro-gress. But he never strikes us as a bigot, and showsa lot of compassion for all of his characters. Con-stantinides also discusses details in the life of P.which tie with his work and the reception which thiswork found among Greek critics.

Of the twelve stories the first, "Fortune fromAmerica," and the last, "The American," placed therefor obvious reasons, bracket "The Homesick Wife,""The Haunted Bridge" (which echoes the well-knownGreek folk song 'The Bridge of Arta'), "The Match-maker" (where a male character ends up by marryingthe woman to whom he was sent on behalf of someoneelse), "The Bewitching of the Aga," "Civilization in

the Village: a Christmas Story," "A Dream among theWaters," "A Shrew of a Mother," "Love the Harvester:a May Day Idyll" (the most 'pagan' of the stories,an adaptation of the ancient myth of the nymph Gala-tea and the herdsman Polyphemus), "The Voice of the

Dragon," "The Marriage of K.arahmet." The last story,"The American," also mirrors an ancient story, thatof Odysseus returning to Ithaka and his faithfulwoman.

P. is not easy to translate, given his idiosyn-cratic style which combines purist Greek in the nar-rative parts of his stories and dialect, or, generally,colloquial speech, in dialogue. Constantinides did a

very commendable job in translating these stories intofluent and accurate English and in attaching a set of

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helpful notes to the translations. Extremely rare arethe spots where certain words could have been renderedbetter, as, for instance, in "Love the Harvester" (p.106), "to pick flowers" would sound more natural than"to cut flowers," and ibid. (p. 114), "lot" ratherthan "portion" is the correct rendition of the Greekkliros. Masterful seem to be the rhyming versions ofcertain poems which spice P.'s stories. There is noindex.

-- G. Thaniel

*Biographical and critical meterial on P. in Englishare found in L. Politis, A History of Modern GreekLiterature (Oxford, 1973), pp. 166-69; K. Th. Dimaras,A History of Modern Greek Literature (State Universi-ty of N. Y. Press, 1972), pp. 389-93; En:rcyclopediaof World Literature in the 20th Century (New York,1983). Vol. III, pp. 471-72. One should also cite"The Seventh Annual Celebration of Greek Letters Hono-ring Alexandros Papadiamantis," 25 May 1984, at theUniversity of Minnesota, Minneapolis. The event in-cluded an exhibit of books, readings from P. and alecture by D. R. Weinberg, "~The Literary Art of Ale-xandros Papadiamantis."-

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EDITOR: G. Thaniel