The Greek Star

Angelos Sikelianos, the youngest of seven children descended from a noble family, was born on the Heptanesian island of Leveas and spent his childhood in a cultivated, Greek-speaking environment.  He went on to study law at Athens for a short while, but abandoned his studies to join a theater group in 1902.

His first important work, The Light-Shadowed which has over 2,000 lines was written in early 1907 and privately published in 1909.  It is a mixture of free and metrical verse, had an immediate impact and was recognized by critics as an important work. Between 1913 and 1915, he published sonnets and assorted poems – The Song of Calypso,  Pan—Thalero—The Mother of Dante – as well as victory songs based on incidents from the Balkan wars or  historical landscapes.

Sikelianos met Eva Palmer, an American graduate student in Paris.  They married   in Bar Harbor in 1907 and moved to Athens in 1909.  Her funds assisted Sikelianos with his publications. During that period Sikelianos came in contact with Greek intellectuals.  He travelled all over Greece absorbing its monuments and art; studying classical literature by himself, the Orphic writing, Aeschylus, and Pindar and preparing the ambitious synthesis of Hellenist and personal spiritualism.

In 1933, Eva left Sikelianos and went back to the United States to raise more money.  She was cut off in America by World War II and even accepted Sikelianos’s  relationship with another woman ANNA KARAMANI whom he married in 1940.   Eva returned to Greece in 1952, died and was interred at Delphi.  

During the German occupation, Sikelianos became a source of inspiration to the Greek people especially through his speech and poems he recited at the funeral of Kostis Palamas.  It was Sikelianos who composed the letter which was spearheaded by 

Archbishop Damaskinos to save the lives of Greek Jews by appealing directly to the Germans.  There is no similar document of protest against Nazi occupiers during World War II that has come to light in any other European country.

The death of Sikelianos’ sister Penelope inspired another important work, MITIR THEOU in which the central figure symbolized both the Virgin Mary and Greek goddess Demeter, a blending of sources that critics consider typical of his approach to poetry.  

EASTER of the GREEKS was a bold attempt to reinterpret the myth of Christianity in narrative verse.  He directed his poetry toward the ideal of religious syncretism.

Sikelianos also befriended fellow-writer Nikos Kazantzakis and in 1914 they spent 40 days on Mt. Athos visiting most of the monasteries there and living the life of ascetics.  The two writers were kindred spirits, but also very different in their respective view of life.  Together, however, they shared the mutual concern of attempting to refine and elevate the human spirit through artistic pursuits.

Sikelianos was a Greek lyric poet and playright and wrote on national history, religious symbolism and universal harmony.  He was the first twentieth century Greek poet being a candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature.  He died in Athens after accidentally ingesting Lyson after having requested Nujol, a medicine, in 1951.

He is generally recognized as the most important Greek poet between Cavafy and Seferis.

In honor of the memory of Angelos and Eva Sikelianos, the European Cultural Centre of Delphi bought and restored their house in Delphi, which is today the Museum of Delphic Festivals.

ПΑΝ

Στἀ βρἀχια τοϋ ἒρμοu ἀκρογιαλιου καἰ στἧς τραχιἀς χαλικωσιἆς 

τἠ λαύρα,

τό μεσημερι ὄμοιο πηγἠ, δἰπλα ἀπὀ κύμα σμάραγδο,

τρέμοντας ὄλο ἀνάβρα΄. . .

Γαλάζια τριἠρη στὀ βυθὀν άνάμεσα σὀ ἐαρινους  αφρούς,

 η Σαλαμιἱνα,

καἱ της Κινέτας, μέσα μου κατάβαθος άναστασμός, 

πεύκα καί σκίνα.

PAN

(Translated by Edmund Keeley and Philip 

Sherrard)

Over rocks on the deserted shore, 

over the burning heat 

of harsh pebbles,

beside the emerald waves, noon, like a fountain,

rose simmering.

Salamis a blue trireme deep in the sea,

in spring’s spindrift;

the pines and mastic trees of Kineta a deep breath

I drew inside me.

Sources:  Wikipedia; Poetry Criticism;  

Encyclopedia of Modern Greek Literature.

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When I first embarked on producing a documentary eight years ago, I never would have imagined the memories I would stir. My film chronicles child refugees of the Greek Civil War, of which my father, uncles and aunts are among.  I quickly discovered this story is more than a family story. It is a story of children of ALL wars--torn by bloodshed, forced to leave their homeland, culture and families behind, and not knowing if they would survive.

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