A selection of the poetry of this winner of the Nobel Prize demonstrates the development of his writing from his early works to recent experimental poems

Odysseus Elytis : selected poems (English and Greek Edition)

Literature & Fiction

Odysseus Elytis

Poetry

Penguin

This representative selection from the work of one of modern Greece’s most fascinating poets was made shortly after his award of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1979. It is drawn from all periods of his distinguished career and traces his development from early surrealism, in which he transforms French influence into a distinct personal voice and mythology, through the dramatic style of The Axion Esti with its blend of spirituality and earthiness, up to the later work in which he experiments with new modes for expressing his perennial themes. The poems are chosen, introduced and mainly translated by the leading translators of modern Greek poetry, Edmund Keeley and the late Philip Sherrard, whose collaborations also included translations of Seferis, Cavafy and Sikelianos. Other contributors to the book include George Savidis, Nanos Valaoritis and John Stathatos. Born in Crete in 1911, Odysseus Elytis began to publish his poetry in the 1930s. He took part in the campaign against the Italian fascists in Albania in 1940-41. He was one of the most prominent poets of the Greek resistance during the Nazi occupation. The Nobel Prize was awarded to him for his poetry which, against the background of Greek tradition, depicts with sensuous strength and intellectual clear-sightedness modern man’s struggle for freedom and creativeness’. He died in Athens in 1996.

Odysseus Elytis: Selected Poems 1940-1979

Anvil Press Poetry

The poetry of Odysseus Elytis owes as much to the ancients and Byzantium, as to the surrealists of the 1930s and the architecture of the Cyclades, bringing romantic modernism and structural experimentation to Greece. Collected here are the two speeches Elytis gave on his acceptance of the 1979 Nobel Prize for Literature, which are still strikingly relevant today. He addresses a hypertrophic and atrophic Europe in moral chaos, with as many coexisting values as languages-and to this he offers the "common language" that is found in poetry, in art, and in their base materials of sense, aesthetic, intuition. Ultimately, his is a powerful ode to beauty amid utilitarianism, and the need for poetry as "the art of approaching that which surpasses us" and "puts us at the threshold of the deepest truth". Odysseus Elytis (1911-1996) has been a leading figure in the "Generation of the 1930s", whose poets, influenced by surrealism, renewed contemporary Greek poetry. During the post-war years he lived for long periods in France, where he associated with the pioneers of the world's avant-garde (Reverdy, Tzara, Breton, Ungaretti, Matisse, Picasso, Giacometti). He published seventeen collections of poetry, translations from ancient Greek and modern European poets, and two volumes of prose. In 1979 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. "And, lo and behold, here I am today in Stockholm, my only treasure a few Greek words. Humble words but alive, because they are on the lips of a whole people. They are three thousand years old, but as fresh as if just drawn from the sea, from the pebbles and sea-weed of an Aegean shore: from the deep blue and total transparency of the aether". From Odysseus Elytis' speech at the Nobel Banquet City Hall, Stockholm, December 10, 1979

In the Name of Luminosity and Transparency

Literary

Aiora Books

Lovely poetry book. Poems are written in Greek and English.

Journal of an Unseen April

Ypsilon / Books

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Books by Odysseus Elytis

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Odysseus Elytis. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Odysseus Elytis : selected poems (English and Greek Edition)

Odysseus Elytis: Selected Poems 1940-1979

In the Name of Luminosity and Transparency

Journal of an Unseen April