The Selected Letters of Nikos Kazantzakis

The life of Nikos Kazantzakis-the author of Zorba the Greek and The Last Temptation of Christ-was as colorful and eventful as his fiction. And nowhere is his life revealed more fully or surprisingly than in his letters. Edited and translated by Kazantzakis scholar Peter Bien, this is the most comprehensive selection of Kazantzakis's letters in any language.One of the most important Greek writers of the twentieth century, Kazantzakis (1883-1957) participated in or witnessed some of the most extraordinary events of his times, including both world wars and the Spanish and Greek civil wars. As a foreign correspondent, an official in several Greek governments, and a political and artistic exile, he led a relentlessly nomadic existence, living in France, Czechoslovakia, Austria, Germany, Italy, Spain, the Soviet Union, and England. He visited the Versailles Peace Conference, attended the tenth-anniversary celebration of the Bolshevik Revolution, interviewed Mussolini and Franco, and briefly served as a Greek cabinet minister-all the while producing a stream of novels, poems, plays, travel writing, autobiography, and translations. The letters collected here touch on almost every aspect of Kazantzakis's rich and tumultuous life, and show the genius of a man who was deeply attuned to the artistic, intellectual, and political events of his times.

Introduction ixHis Importance ixA Maniacal Epistolographer xCompleteness xiAnnotations xiTransliteration xiAcknowledgments xiiChronology xvii
The Letters

ChapterI: At Law School in Athens1902Letters 11903Letters 101904Letters 181905Letters 241906Letters 301907Letters 34

ChapterII: Pursuing Graduate Studies in Paris1907Letters, continued 371908Letters 38

ChapterIII: Politically Active in Greece1909Letters 461911Letters 481912Letters 501913Letters 551914Letters 561915Letters 611917Letters 661918Letters 721919Letters 781920Letters 82

ChapterIV: Fleeing Greece; Resident in Austria, Germany, Italy1922Letters 841923Letters 1411924Letters 191

ChapterV: . Meets Eleni Samiou; Begins Odyssey; Divorces Galatea; Travels to Soviet Union1924Letters, continued 2061925Letters 2151926Letters 2311927Letters 245

ChapterVI: Resident Almost Eighteen Months in the Soviet Union1927Letters, continued 2721928Letters 2911929Letters 323

ChapterVII: Trying to Make a Career Outside of Greece, Especially in Spain1929Letters, continued 3491930Letters 3681931Letters 3851932Letters 4091933Letters 439

ChapterVIII: Back in Greece, Having Failed Elsewhere; Traveling in Far East; Odyssey Completed and Published; Visit to England1933Letters, continued 4601934Letters 4761935Letters 4801936Letters 4951937Letters 5011938Letters 5101939Letters 5161940Letters 529

ChapterIX: Confined to Aegina during the GermanOccupation; Writes Zorba and Many Plays;Begins to Translate Homer's Iliad1941Letters 5371942Letters 5451943Letters 5591944Letters 590

ChapterX: In Athens during Round Two of the Civil War; Resolves to Help Liberated Greece via Political Action; Briefly a Cabinet Minister; Marries Eleni Samiou1944Letters, continued 6001945Letters 6001946Letters 609

ChapterXI : Final Exile: Resides Briefly in England, Then in France; Writes Final Novels and Plays; Travels to China1946Letters, continued 6151947Letters 6321948Letters 6571949Letters 6761950Letters 6891951Letters 7091952Letters 7271953Letters 7421954Letters 7471955Letters 7721956Letters 8081957Letters 833
References Cited 853Index 859