I really enjoyed Friar’s anthology of Modern Greek Poets. So I took a look to see what else is out there on 20th century Greek poetry. I found a 2002 anthology edited by Nanos Valaoritis & Thanasis Maskaleris. I know Valaoritis as the Greek surrealist who wrote for Hitchcock’s Kayak in the 60s and 70s. His anthology unsurprisingly celebrates the Greek surrealists, and he provides excellent short historical introductions to each poet.
I will be starting an index of surrealists, likely categorized by country. Thanks to Valaoritis, I have a head start for the entry for Greek Surrealists.
The Surrealists
Anastasios Drivas (1899-1942)
Andreas Embirikos (1901-1975)
Nicolaos Calas (1907-1988)
Nikos Engonópoulos (1910-1985)
Odysseus Elytis (1911-1996)
Nikos Gatsos (1912-1992)
Miltos Sachtouris (1919-)
Ektor Kaknavatos (1920-)
Yorgos Likos (1920-2001)
Nanos Valaoritis (1921-)
Epameinondas Gonatas (1924-)
D.P. Papaditsas (1922-1987)
Neo-Surrealists
Tasos Denegris (1934-)
Michalis Papanicolaou (1937-)
Eva Mylona (1938-)
Dino Siotis (1944-)
Lefteris Poulios (1944-)
Pavlina Pampoudi (1948-)
Dimitris Kalokyris (1948-)
Both Friar’s and Valaoritis’s anthologies have brought to my attention for how important Surrealism was in Greece. Compared to other European countries outside of France (all of which had their small surrealist groups), Greece seems to be a special case, where, Valaoritis says, Surrealism’s influence energized a “miniature Renaissance”:
These new departures [i.e., the work of Emberikos and Calas] created excitement among younger poets, including Nikos Engonopoulos and Nikos Gatsos, who produced their own distinctive versions of Embirikos' achievement. The result was a renewal of the lyrical idiom in Greek poetry with brilliant images, new concepts, and unusual metaphors and similes. The impact that these poets had was electrical. It was nothing short of a miniature Renaissance such as Greece had been denied, with the exception of a brief regional flowering in the Cretan and Cypriot dialect, during the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries under the Ottomans. The 1930s saw poetry such as had never been written in Greek.
Here are a few poems to whet your appetite:
I See Your Waving Tallness
Anastasios Drivas
Mimicking very ancient models among ruins fashioned with the power of the flame that gives color color to the voice the cloud and the small flower; at Dawn when I return to cool horizons and look upon you with the longing of a mother for her child still asleep on your bed of stone.
Columns of the temple of Olympian Zeus
Nicolas Calas [trans. Kimon Friar]
At night the azure columns of the temple turn pale but lift their wounded stature to unreachable skies in vain no one understands the wordless supplication of an old adoration directed to Zeus by the suggestive lines of chiseled stone the acanti have rusted and the fearless capitals are blown bodily by erotic winds that seek refuge there these marbles have been reduced to being liturgists of the hymen any other meaning they had has vanished archeologists strive in vain to find a coherence in fragments that history has cast far away from itself the muted members lie on the ground not even one footfall of a faithful follower disturbs them not a single shadow rechoes amid the ruins and these have betrayed my walk its purpose has vanished in a night far distant from its starless roof and the coherence of history has vanished, cannot be found. I become envious of these cold stone, masses that have been standing here wordless for centuries now listening to the sweet echo of past emotions.
Nikos Engonópoulos [trans. Thanasis Maskaleris]:
A Bad Image
Miltos Sachtouris [trans. Nanos Valaoritis]
Eggs were breaking and brought out into the world sick children like broken stars black pigeons chased the sun with dirty towels with horrible shrieks the sea boiled her birds were burning the expelled fish wept on the mountain and a raging moon howled all tied up light a slaughtered ox.
The Find
Epameinontas Gonatas [trans. Nikos Stangos]
I woke up suddenly and sat up on the bed. Someone was calling me. Trembling light was coming in through the window, together with the panting of the sea. I had a strong taste in my mouth as if I'd chewed on cloves. For the second time I heard the voice calling me. I quickly put on a shirt and went out. I walked down the flagstone path, went past the square towards the sea; it was now quiet and calm, not foaming, and on it you could make out clearly, as on dry mud, the foot prints of a large animal. Muffled groans came now and then from a rock. I searched all round for an opening in it, but did not find one. I started to hack into the stone with a pick. In the hole I made appeared the head of a bird. It was bony, covered in earth and grass. As I was cleaning it, it felt in my hands as if made of wood. "Could I have unearthed an ancient wooden statue?" I thought as I groped to find out what it was made of. It felt like a thickly woven mat; but as soon as I squeezed it more, it crumbled like dry mint rustling horribly between my fingers.
Art: Eduard Bezembinder, “Greeks”