ODYSSEUS ELYTIS
SHORT BIO
Odysseus Elytis was born in Iraklion, Crete, on 2 November 1911, and lived most of his life in Athens, to where his family moved in 1914. His island of origin –Lesbos–, his birthplace –Crete–, and his childhood summers spent in Spetses and the Cyclades created in him a deep consciousness of the Aegean islands, which later, on coming into contact with contemporary artistic trends, particularly with surrealism, gave birth to a poetry which was original, full of lyrical images, revolutionary forces and universal values. His poetry, with the light as its focal point and through the transcendent dimension of nature and the spirituality of the senses, sought to uncover the mystery of existence.
On finishing High-School in Athens, he went on to study Law and also served as a Lieutenant in the Albanian Campaign. He twice went to live in Paris (1948 – 1951 and 1969 – 1971), where he attended courses in literature at the Sorbonne and came into contact with major 20th-century poets and painters (Picasso, Matisse, Breton, Chagall). He was awarded honorary doctorates from the universities of The Sorbonne, Oxford, Rome, Athens, Thessaloniki, and was made a Grand Commander of the Legion d’ Honneur by the French Republic. In 1979, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. He devoted himself to poetry until his death on 18 March 1996.
SELECTED WORKS
Orientations (1940)
Sun the First (1943)
Heroic and Elegiac Song for the Lost Second Lieutenant of the Albanian Campaign (1945)
Axion Esti (1959)
Six and One Remorses for the Sky (1960)
The Light-tree and the Fourteenth Beauty (1971)
The Sovereign Sun (1971)
The Monogram (1971)
The Rhos of Eros (1972)
Open Papers (1974)
Stepchildren (1974)
Second Writing (1976)
Book of Signals (1977)
Maria Nephele (1978)
Three Poems Under a Flag of Convenience (1982)
Diary of an Invisible April (1984)
Sappho (1984)
Revelation of John (1985)
The Little Mariner (1985)
Krinagoras (1987)
Private Road (1990)
The Oxopetra Elegies (1991)
Carte Blanche (1992)
West of Sorrow (1995)
The Garden of Self-delusions (1995)
From Close By (1998)
Poetry (Collected Poems, 2002)
WORKS
by Odysseus Elytis translated in English (selected)
The Sovereign Sun: Selected Poems, tr. Kimon Friar, Temple University Press, Philadelphia, 1980
Maria Nephele: A Poem in Two Voices, tr. Athan Anagnostopoulos, Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston, 1981
Poems, tr. Nanos Valaoritis, Wire Press, San Francisco, 1982
What I Love: Selected Poems of Odysseas Elytis, tr. Olga Broumas, Copper Canyon Press, Port Townsend, Washington, 1986
Open Papers, tr. Olga Broumas – T. Begley, Copper Canyon Press, Port Townsend, Washington, 1995
The Collected Poems of Odysseus Elytis, tr. Jeffrey Carson – Nikos Sarris, Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 2004
The Αxion Εsti, tr. Edmund Keeley – George Savidis, Anvil Press Poetry, London, 2007
The Oxopetra Elegies and West of Sorrow, tr. David Connolly, Harvard University Press, 2014
TRANSLATIONS
Sappho, reconstruction and rendering of Odysseus Elytis (Ikaros, 1984, 1996)
John The Apocalypse, New Greek form Odysseus Elytis (ypsilon/books, 1985)
Krinagoras, form in New Greek Odysseus Elytis (ypsilon/books, 1987)
Second Scripture – RIMBAUD, LAUTRÉAMONT, ÉLUARD, JOUVE, UNGARETTI, LORCA, MAIAKOVSKI (Ikaros, 1976)
Jean Girondou, Fairy (Study Society of Moraitis School, 1973- ypsilon/books, 2015)
Bertolt Brecht, The Chalk Circle in the Caucasus (Moraitis School of Studies Society, 1974, ypsilon/books, 2010)
Jean Genet, The Slaves (ypsilon/books, 1994)
SPECIAL EDITIONS
The Nautilus of the Century (dedicated edition, Ikaros, 2011)
"The world the small, the great!" by Odysseus Elytis with the music of Giorgos Kouroupos (pentalingual anthology, with two radio discs, 'Ikaros, 2016)
