Books - Contemporary Greece
In Tearing Haste: Letters Between Deborah Devonshire and Patrick Leigh Fermor
Patrick Leigh Fermor: The man who walked (The Telegraph, 06.09.2008)Sir Patrick 'Paddy' Michael Leigh Fermor, the British author, scholar and soldier, who played a prominent role behind the lines in the Battle of Crete during World War II, is famous for his travel writing and is widely regarded as "Britain's greatest living travel writer”. On the occasion of the publication of the book 'In Tearing Haste: Letters Between Deborah Devonshire and Patrick Leigh Fermor', the Telegraph has interviewed the famous writer and philhellene, in his house at Mani. “Foremost among Leigh Fermor's books are his two glorious Greek travelogues, Mani: Travels in the Southern Peloponnesei and Roumeli:Travels In Northern Greece; an exquisite short study of monasticism, A Time to Keep Silence; and most celebrated of all, “A Time of Gifts” the first volume of an account of his journey in the early 1930s, travelling on foot, sleeping in hayricks and castles 'like a tramp, a pilgrim, or a wandering scholar', from Holland to Constantinople. In the early 1960s that Leigh Fermor married Joan Elizabeth Rayner, and settled down with her in Kardamyli, to continue his life of writing travel books. It is this more settled phase of life that is so well captured in the new book of letters between Leigh Fermor and Deborah Devonshire. There are lovely descriptions of Leigh Fermor and Joan finding the bay at Kardamyli; the struggles to finish A Time of Gifts; Leigh Fermor's surprise and pleasure at its rapturous reception; and the slow writing of its sequel.” Read more...
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Arnold Zable: Sea of Many Returns
Xanthe is compelled to return to the birthplace of her father, Manoli, and her maternal grandfather, Mentor, prompted by family and literary associations. Xanthe is translating Mentor's manuscript, an account of leaving Ithaca and his subsequent life in Australia. The book takes the reader to modern-day Ithaca, to its mountains, its villages and its harbours, and into the houses of its people.
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Ithaka and Odysseus’ journeys have inspired many writers. Arnold Zable's new novel, Sea of Many Returns, charts more recent comings and goings from Ithaca, explores the sense of physical and emotional journeying, and continues the renowned author’s fascination with the migrant experience.
Why I Love Greece
The volume, entitled “Why I love Greece”, includes a special pictorial section featuring news and photos of international celebrities who have visited Greece in the past. |
Fifteen foreign correspondents, who have lived and worked in Greece for years, join forces to put together a volume with personal recollections and snapshots from places in Greece they cherish, revealing why they have come to love Greece, and which particular part of Greece has made an inordinate impression on them.
First Chinese book on Greece (ANA-MPA, 21.01.2007)
The first book on contemporary Greece ever published in China was presented in Beijing on Friday. The 428-page book was written by assistant professor and researcher at the Institute of European Studies Song Xiaomin, who has had a long and fruitful collaboration with the Press and Communication Office of the Greek Embassy. The book is written in Chinese and depicts various aspects of contemporary Greece such as its history, its political system, economy, culture and tourism.The book is prefaced by Minister of State and Government Spokesman Theodoros Roussopoulos, and contains a message by Greek Ambassador to Beijing Michalis Kambanis. Read more... |
Sofka Zinovief: Eurydice Street
Her book "Eurydice Street" is a wonderfully fresh, funny, and inquiring account of her first year as an Athenian. Read more...
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Sofka Zinovieff is half-Russian and was born in London, in 1961. She had fallen in love with Greece as a student, but little she suspected that years later she would return for good with an expatriate Greek husband and two young daughters.
John Lucas: 92 Acharnon Street
Lucas recreates many conversations, quietly revealing of Greek reality. This is not English travel writing in the baroque tradition; his Greece is the contemporary one and his book is full of incidents which shed a clear, unshowy light on the country he discovered in early middle-age.
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Nicholas Murray reviews the book "92 Acharnon Street" written by John Lucas. John Lucas's book is an attractive memoir of his period as "Lord Byron visiting professor of English" at the University of Athens in 1984-5.
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