Digital Exhibitions
12 Hidden Gems
1. The manuscript of ‘Aniforos’
Read more
The manuscript of ‘Aniforos’ (Uphill) is preserved at the Kazantzakis Museum and is a hidden gem that was literally pulled out of a drawer, as since 2010 copies of its first pages were included in the documents of the re-exhibition of the Museum and were included in the section with the “drawers”, which exhibited documents that were worth investigating further. The manuscript was found in the effects of George Anemogiannis, founder of the Museum, along with other important and unknown until then documents that have been highlighted in recent years.
The first record of the still unknown ‘Aniforos’ was in 2007, when the Museum carried out the maintenance and digitization of its valuable material, and in the initial scientific documentation and cataloguing of its archive. The manuscript of ‘Aniforos’ was among archived at the time, but there was no indication whether it was a completed work and there was no mention of the title, which has been attributed to it now. However, the original documentation of the manuscript included information that Kazantzakis used certain pieces from it in other works and that Eleni Kazantzakis had referred to it as a disavowed work.
In 2016, the manuscript was initially identified with the ‘Aniforos’ “lost” work. In 2017 the manuscript travelled to Athens for the anniversary tribute on the occasion of the Year of Nikos Kazantzakis. In 2018, it was first presented to the academic community. In October 2022, it was published as a book, presented to the public for the first time at the Kazantzakis Museum, and the entire manuscript is now exhibited in a thematic periodic exhibition. After it ends the manuscript will be included in the exhibits of the permanent Exhibition of the Museum.
Nikos Kazantzakis’ ‘Aniforos’ was written in almost a month, in August 1946 in Cambridge, England, and it bears several similarities with Captain Michalis and other earlier or later works by the author.
Upon its publication and release, and in just one week, the work was at the top of newspaper best seller lists, and it renewed interest for Nikos Kazantzakis. The Kazantzakis Museum with the “discovery” of the known-unknown ‘Aniforos’ emerged as an ark that was rescuing and highlighting documents related to the life and work of the author.
2. Notebook - Diary Mount Athos
Read more
One of the most important friends and companions in the life of Nikos Kazantzakis was Angelos Sikelianos, in whose person he saw a great visionary. Their relationship, which became legendary, started in November 1914 when they met at the offices of the ‘Educational Group’ in Athens, where they immediately recognized each other as spiritual companions. A few days later they travelled to Mount Athos for a forty-day pilgrimage, planning the establishment of a new religion, and studying Tolstoy, Buddha, and Dante. Their journey continued the following year in other areas of central Greece. Kazantzakis was often a guest at Sikelianos’ house in Sykia, Corinth, and their relationship deepened and then experienced many fluctuations over time.
They both made sure to record their first, now historic, visit to the “Garden of the Virgin Mary”, each entering into their personal diaries their impressions, and it is very fortunate that both have survived and have been published. While Sikelianos’ Diary is kept in the Department of Manuscripts and Illustrations of the National Library of Greece, Kazantzakis’ Diary is preserved in the Kazantzakis Museum.
It is one of the author’s oldest notebooks-diaries, which has been written in the type of notebook widely used for accounting in the past two centuries (balance ledgers). The size of each page is just 11×16.4 cm and is numbered in the top right corner, in the recto of the sheets. There are handwritten notes on both sides of the cover and the back cover, including which the Calendar comprises 118 handwritten pages. Most of it has been written in pencil. There are rarer different writing methods, in black and blue ink, which may be later additions and notes. In several places there are deletions, underlines or highlights in red or blue, as was the usual practice of Kazantzakis. Of particular interest are his sketches, mainly the maps he designed in the beginning of the diary, of both Halkidiki and the Athos peninsula, where he also captured their route.
The Diary is in the collection of the writer’s Autographs, which George Anemogiannis bequeathed to the Museum. In fact, the Diary was saved thanks to the efforts of the founder of the Museum and his persistence in gathering rare Kazantzaki artefacts, as well as the trust shown by Eleni Kazantzaki, the author’s second wife. Eleni Kazantzakis gave the Diary, as well as other important documents to Anemogiannis, which she may have thought could become important museum exhibits. In 1983 Eleni Kazantzakis confirmed her appreciation and confidence in the efforts of Anemogiannis, characteristically stating in her speech at the opening ceremony of the Museum, “there is no person in the world who has worked with more love for a oeuvre that he believes in, like Mr. Anemogiannis”. A few years later, in 1988 in Geneva, they both attended and were declared honorary members of the International Society of Friends of Nikos Kazantzakis in order to promote the thought and work of Nikos Kazantzakis.
The Mount Athos Diary and its systematic study in recent years have highlighted a somewhat overlooked aspect of the author, that of the systematic journaler, and brought to light the kind of text whose in-depth study may reveal truly unknown and hidden treasures of Nikos Kazantzakis’ thought. His more personal writings, such as his diaries and letters, take us even closer to the creator and the man behind the myth.
The book was published by the Nikos Kazantzakis Museum in 2020.
3. Manuscripts of Kazantzakis’ ‘The Odyssey’
Read more
George Stasinakis, President of the International Society of Friends of Nikos Kazantzakis, was proclaimed in the summer of 2021 an honorary member of the Board of Directors of the Nikos Kazantzakis Museum, which thus wished to recognize his enormous contribution to the dissemination of the author’s spirit throughout the world, as well as to express gratitude for his long-term contribution to the Museum. Among the important ways in which George Stasinakis actively strengthened the work of the Museum since its foundation, honouring it with his love and friendship, what stands out is the enrichment of its collections with great artefacts, like the author’s table from his home in Antibes, France, and manuscripts of ‘The Odyssey’, as well as many other items that are exhibited or preserved in his Archive.
In February 2008, at a warm reception in Heraklion, Crete, George Stasinakis delivered the two volumes with drafts of Kazantzakis’ Odyssey, expressing his joy that this material was to enter the ark of the author’s memory and work, where it belonged, at the Nikos Kazantzakis Museum. These drafts have been exhibited since the renovation of the Museum on the author’s table, in the room dedicated to his ‘Odyssey’.
These two clothbound volumes, dimensions 22X14X4,7 cm, each with about 1000 pages, numbered by the author, which include the entire manuscript of the author’s Odyssey, with corrections and additions. The artefact is dated to between 1929-1931, and the fact that two different types of writing are distinguished is extremely important in studying it, as it seems that the body of the rhapsodies was copied by Eleni Kazantzaki and the corrections, additions and comments in the margins belong to Kazantzakis himself. In the first volume, it is noted that “there will be 7 drafts” and in red pencil it says “ODYSSE I/ draft 2”. There we find rhapsodies 1 to 13, and additions and corrections of rhapsodies 14, 16, 21 and 22, while in the second volume marked “ODYSSEY II/ draft 3 to 4”, we find completed versions of rhapsodies 14 to 24 and corrections/additions for the rhapsodies 1 to 13, with references, in fact, to the corresponding pages of the first volume, namely, the second draft.
We know that Kazantzakis submitted his works in successive processing and thus created different drafts. His text of The Odyssey, his magnum opus, was worked on for thirteen years, from 1925 to 1938, while he had been working on the idea of writing it, as research shows, for much longer. The labour, the tireless work, and the stubbornness to complete his creation, is stated by the heading of the “second temporary draft”, where he notes Leonardo da Vinci’s deeply meaningful quote, “ostinato rigore” (constant rigour), and just below it his own phrase “desperate and unyielding”.
The 33,333-verse Odyssey was printed in 1938 by Pyrsos publications in a massive, large format volume – 835 pages with special-made printing elements, and with a 10-page glossary insert – dedicated to Miss Joe MacLeod, sponsor of the publication. Unfortunately, to this day we do not know where the remaining drafts are, which must have been improvements to parts of the Odyssey, while none have yet been systematically studied. However, the comparison of the Odyssey drafts with the final published text would constitute an important field of scientific research.
A detail identified during the examination of the artefact surprised and moved the scientific team of the Kazantzakis Museum. Behind the hard cover of the first volume is still preserved, dated “31 March 1932”, the telegram Kazantzakis received from his family in Boží Dar (Gottesgab), Czechoslovakia, where he was working these drafts of the Odyssey, with the simple, yet riveting phrase: “mother died.” The one artefact inside the other constitutes the conjunction of poetic creation with the biography of the author, so that here we see not only the creator in his workshop, but also Kazantzakis the man.
Indeed, Kazantzakis lost his mother in the spring of 1932, while abroad, and a few months later his father died. That same year he wrote to Eleni Kazantzaki:
«Θυμούμαι, όταν απογυρίζοντας τη γωνία του δρόμου, για να κατέβω στο λιμάνι, στράφηκα κι είδα —για στερνή φορά— τη μητέρα μου, που στεκόταν στο κατώφλι κι έκλαιγε. Τώρα βρίσκεται στον άλλον όχτο και με τραβάει. Το χώμα πια δε μου είναι αποκρουστικό. Δεν περνάει μέρα, χωρίς να βυθιστώ στο όραμα αυτό˙ δεν περνάει νύχτα, χωρίς να δω τη μητέρα μου στο όνειρο… Ο Άδης πήρε μια αίγλη απροσδόκητη και θαρρώ πώς μονάχα Εσείς με κρατάτε ακόμα στην επιφάνεια της γης.
Μα ας μη μιλώ γι αυτό… Η «Οδύσεια»; Τώρα μου χρειάζεται πιο παρά πριν, για να μη γίνει η καρδιά μου κομμάτια» (Ελένη Καζαντζάκη, Νίκος Καζαντζάκης. Ο Ασυμβίβαστος. Βιογραφία βασισμένη σε ανέκδοτα γράμματα και κείμενά του, επιμ. Πάτροκλος Σταύρου, Εκδόσεις Καζαντζάκη, Αθήνα 19983, σελ. 316).
4. First edition of ‘Zorba the Greek’ with handwritten corrections by the author.
Read more
In the autumn of 2016, the Kazantzakis Museum found at an auction house a rare copy of the first edition of the emblematic novel ‘Zorba the Greek’. The book was purchased by businessman Spyros Kokotos, at the recommendation of Stelios Matzapetakis, then president of the Museum’s Board of Directors. Mr Kokotos donated the artefact to the Museum at a ceremony that followed, and it has since been one of the most important acquisitions in recent years.
The importance of this collectable copy lies in the fact that it bears a number of handwritten corrections and additions made by the author himself, in view of the second edition of the work. It also includes the new arrangement of the text in 25 type elements (compared to 22 in the first edition). In fact, its value was evident by the strong buying interest, as it was sold at double the original asking price of 3500 Euros.
Zorba the Greek is undoubtedly the best known and translated work of the author, it is what established him internationally, it was to a great extent his passport for universal recognition, and what “gave birth” to one of his most famous heroes. In fact, it was the first of his known novels and the only one written in Greece and in Greek before his final departure abroad.
Zorba was written in Aegina in 1941, initially titled ‘The Synaxis of Zorbas’, it was completed in 1943, and it was published for the first time by Dimitrakou Publications in 1946. Zorba’s publication coincided with Kazantzakis’ departure to England as a guest of the British Council that summer. There, living in Cambridge, as recent research has shown, he wrote in no time at all, just a few months, the unknown until recently novel ‘Aniforos’, before Zorba had even been published in Greece and before it was translated and published abroad. Indeed, we speculate that the great success of the book and the immediate response of the foreign public to its translations was one of the reasons ‘Aniforos’ stayed tucked away.
Careful examination of this unique copy is of great interest, mainly as to the expressive choices of the author, and it is an important testimony that allows us to do something particularly charming for any era and any creator: To peek at his “workshop”. The second edition of the book was published several years later, in 1954, and some of Kazantzakis’ corrections made it into that edition, others made it into subsequent ones, and others were later removed by the publishers. Thus, what is of even greater interest in the search of his “literary will”, is the comparison and comparative examination of all publications and republications of the work.
For the Kazantzakis Museum, the Kokotos’ donation was a practical confirmation that the Museums are made up by their collections and their people. Among the Museum’s important “others” are its donors with their selfless donations. To our question, Mr. Kokotos replied: “Of course I donated it to the Museum, since I believe that is where it belongs, not unseen, on a library shelf.”
5. Kazantzakis’ Cretan vourgiali (bag)
Read more
“Kazantzakis kept the notebooks in which he wrote ‘The Odyssey’ (each notebook was a rhapsody) in a beautiful Cretan vourgiali (shoulder bag), a present I’d given him that had been woven in Rethimno on purpose”, mentioned Pantelis Prevelakis, one of Kazantzakis’ dearest friends, in 400 Letters from Kazantzakis to Prevelakis (p. 40).
These bags were used to transport food and drinks, but also documents or books. This vourgiali is woollen, woven on a traditional Cretan loom, originating in central Crete (Regional Unit of Rethimno and Heraklion) and dates to the late 19th century, as we are informed by the research of Ms Zoi Papadaki, founder of the weaving workshop Ergastini, which she kindly shared with us. It belongs to the category of embroidered textiles with woven decoration, and the main colour red, while the ksomplia (decorations) are in a large variety of colours. The front side has been woven using the kilim technique, in decorative zones with geometric motifs, mainly diamonds. The back side, not intended to be visible, uses a basic weaving technique in a striped pattern. The two sides are sewn together with a special colourful seam called a wheel.
In 1960, a young Fred Reed, later a prominent journalist, translator, and writer, accidentally bought in a Hollywood bookstore the English translation of the novel Christ Recrucified. As he revealed, this book was to change his life. He learned Greek and in a few years his translation of Kazantzakis’ work Journey to Morea was published.
«Για λόγους πολιτικούς μου ήταν αδύνατο να φύγω από τον Καναδά, όπου είχα βρει καταφύγιο ως ανυπόταχτος στον αμερικάνικο στρατό στο Βιετνάμ. Έστειλα λοιπόν τη σύζυγό μου ως αντιπρόσωπο στην Γενεύη, όπου κατοικούσε η κα. Καζαντζάκη. Τότε, σε μια συναισθηματικά φορτωμένη συνάντηση της χάρισε το κόκκινο κρητικό βουργιάλι». Reed then kept the vourgiali in his home for years, using it as a decorative item. Finally, the artefact was donated to the Kazantzakis Museum in 2013, and Dionysios Skaliotis, a good friend of Fred Reed for decades, played a significant role in the donation, while he also delivered the vourgiali to the Museum.
The Nikos Kazantzakis Museum has a special collection of personal belongings of the global writer. His personal belongings, among other things, provide us with important information about Kazantzakis, the man. His daily life and personal habits are reflected in the use of these objects of material culture.
6. Anthony Quinn’s screenplay from ‘Zorba the Greek’
Read more
From the moment George Anemogiannis decided to establish the Nikos Kazantzakis Museum, his constant aim was to include the entire scope of the impact of the great authors’ work worldwide. Thus, apart from Kazantzakis’ books, he successfully turned to searching for all the art forms in which Kazantzakis’ work was expressed: film, theatre, dance, music; his work as a set and costume designer and his close relationship with the theatre world would help him significantly in his quest.
Discovering and gathering material related to the various productions of Zorba (film, theatre, musical theatre, etc.) from around the world was one of the first things that George Anemogiannis had to deal with after he decided to establish the Kazantzakis Museum. By 1979 he had managed to gather relevant material from theatrical performances and musical theatre performances of Zorba that had been staged in Europe, while he was in contact with producers from the USA. Among the vast quantity of material that he succeeded in gathering and preserving, the screenplay from the film version of ‘Zorba the Greek’ by Michael Cacoyannis stands out.
Kazantzakis had collaborated with Cacoyannis in London for the needs of BBC radio broadcasts immediately after the Second World War, and since then they corresponded sporadically. In 1954 they met again at Cannes Film Festival, where they attended the festival’s screenings together in Kazantzakis’ booth. There, Kazantzakis expressed his desire to see a work of his being adapted to film with Cacoyannis directing. Kazantzakis’ desire became a reality 9 years later.
Cacoyannis had by then the financial capacity to undertake the production of Zorba himself and had managed to solve the screenplay problems that had discouraged many other creators from attempting to adapt Kazantzakis’ book for film. The film was shot in 1964 in Crete and distributed by 20th Century Fox.
Reviews for the film were glorious, focusing on Cacoyannis’ excellent directing and screenplay, the excellent acting of the leads, and of course the unforgettable music of Mikis Theodorakis. At the 37th Academy Awards (1965) the film was nominated for 7 Awards (Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Director, Best Screenplay, B Supporting Actress, Best Black and White Cinematography, and Best Black and White Set Design), winning the last 3. In addition, it was nominated for 5 Golden Globes, 4 BAFTA Awards, while Theodorakis was also nominated for the Grammy Award in the best music written for film category. Commercially, the film was a huge success with just the US box office coming to nine times the production cost.
The embodiment of Kazantzakis’ legendary character on the silver screen by Anthony Quinn was so perfect that it is remembered in the history of cinema as one of the finest performances ever. Quinn, although he starred in more than 150 films, was marked as an actor by his role as Zorbas more than any other, leading him to his fourth Oscar nomination. Indeed, Quinn himself in an interview had confessed that Zorba’s character influenced him decisively, both on a personal level, pushing him to adopt a freer and more carefree life, but also as an actor, as he tried to add touches of Zorba’s spirit to all his later roles. “I will never be able to be alienated from the role of Zorba. It was something like my own life,” he said in an interview.
Quinn admired the expressive power and depth of Kazantzakis’ ideas, and so he worked very intensively, with respect and emphasis on the smallest detail, to render Zorba’s character as well as possible. Cacoyannis had demanded that by the time filming started, he had become a perfect performer of Greek dances. Thus, for two months Quinn rehearsed intensively and worked closely with Theodorakis to give to the famous Zorba Dance the soul and spirit of Zorba in its entirety.
7. Tsarouchis costume designs for the film Christ Recrucified
Read more
In 1948 Nikos Kazantzakis completed one of his most famous novels and a great publishing success, ‘Christ Recrucified’.
In 1955 successful American director Jules Dassin visited Kazantzakis and his wife at their home in southern France, the legendary ‘Koukouli’ (Cocoon), where he read them the screenplay he had written for the film adaptation in French of ‘Christ Recrucified’, titled ‘Celui qui doit mourir’ (‘The One Who Must Die’). On a subsequent visit, the director was accompanied by his wife, Melina Mercouri, who was destined to become a good friend of the couple, and, years later, as Minister of Culture, would inaugurate the Nikos Kazantzakis Museum. Kazantzakis liked Dassin’s screenplay and production began.
The film was shot in the summer in Kritsa, Lassithi, Crete, with the villagers actively participating in supporting the film and appearing in many scenes, as they considered it an honour to be part of a work by Kazantzakis. Filming was completed in 1957, with Melina Mercouri in the role of Magdalene and Pierre Vaneck as Christ. The music was written by Georges Auric, but the Greek themes with the wonderful choir elements, which either sing the national anthem, psalms, or folk songs, intensifying the imposing tones and giving the film a strong Greek identity, were edited by Manos Hadjidakis.
The costumes were designed by another vastly important figure of Modern Greek Art, Yannis Tsarouchis. Yannis Tsarouchis (1910–1989) is considered one of the greatest contemporary Greek painters with international exposure especially in France, Italy and the USA. At the same time, he worked as a set designer in Greek and foreign theatres with great success. His work and personality influenced Modern Greek Art decisively, leading the demand of the time for the Greekness of art, however, in harmonious coexistence with global art currents. His creations include assimilations of many folk and folklore elements from folk architecture and clothing to scenes from the everyday life of regular Greeks in the neighbourhoods of Piraeus and the provinces, and forms originating from Byzantine iconography.
The Nikos Kazantzakis Museum has the great pleasure and honour of having in its collection and exhibiting in its Permanent Exhibition, the designs of two Tsarouchis costumes for Dassin’s film, as well as a photograph from the test of costumes with Tsarouchis overseeing the rehearsal. These are the costumes of the ‘Papa-Fotis’ and ‘Youssoufaki’ characters. They are designed on paper from 35 cm x 25 cm sketch pad and they are signed by the Tsarouchis. These unique designs were donated by N. L. Toutountzakis to the Kazantzakis Museum and its founder, George Anemogiannis. The Museum, in its systematic effort to protect its collections, proceeded in 2008–2009 to the full conservation of these designs, protecting them from the passage of time.
The film premièred on 3 March 1957 at Cannes Film Festival’s official program, with Kazantzakis and Eleni present, alongside Dassin and Melina. Kazantzakis, moved, said: «Δεν είμαι από τους συγγραφείς εκείνους που θέλουν η ταινία να αποτελεί πιστό αντίγραφο του έργου. Ο κινηματογράφος οφείλει να υπακούσει σε μια τεχνική πολύ διαφορετική από την τεχνική του μυθιστορήματος. Μπορώ να σας πω ότι η ταινία του Ζιλ Ντασσέν με συνεκλόνισε και είμαι ευτυχής, διότι η διασκευή δεν πρόδωσε καθόλου το πρωτότυπο.» This was the only film based on his work that Kazantzakis was able to watch, as he died a few months later.
8. Costume designs for the play ‘Sodom and Gomorrah’
Read more
Nikos Kazantzakis wrote the play ‘Sodom and Gomorrah’ in Antibes in 1948, in just 13 days. It was published in 1949. It is a tragedy of theological reflection, in which Kazantzakis deals with the issue of human rebellion, modifying the Biblical narrative to highlight the elements he wanted.
Rachel Lipstein, a close Jewish friend of Kazantzakis, had expressed some Biblical objections to the author regarding how Abraham was portrayed in his work. In a letter, Kazantzakis replied: “I was in need of an Abraham, a ‘sheep’, I found in the Bible another Abraham, I edited him to serve my plans. It is so good and so right to rush Tradition a little, this old woman! For the creator, just and unjust, good and evil, God and devil no longer exist. There is only one flame, which hungers and devours all these juicy foods.”
The play was performed for the first time at the historical National Theatre of Mannheim (Nationaltheater Mannheim), where in 1782 Friedrich Schiller had first staged his first, iconic work, ‘The Robbers’ . It is important that Kazantzakis, in his final years of secondary school in Heraklion, had attended this particular performance,and it had remained engraved in his memory, as it was the first time he had seen a theatrical performance.
The performance was staged under the title ‘Feuer über Sodom’ (‘Fire Over Sodom’) and it premièred on 1 December 1954 with Kazantzakis and his wife in attendance. Shortly before the performance, Kazantzakis gave an interview to well-known German journalist, writer, and artist, Fritz Nötzoldt, in which he expressed his love of books, German culture, and literature, and his good relations with Germany over time. Nevertheless, the show was a big disappointment for Kazantzakis. He wrote to Prevelakis: “In Mannheim they understood nothing of ‘Sodom’. It was like a ballet. It was played three times, a lot of people came, but I couldn’t watch it and I begged the manager to take it down. They didn’t ask me at all, when they studied it, what I want to say, and they did whatever their little brains came up with.”
The show was directed by Wolfgang von Stass, starring Erich Musil and Aldona Ehret as Lot and his wife, Jörg Schleicher and Lucy Valenta as the royal couple, and Friedrich Gröndahl as the Angel. Hans Schwartz adapted the script, translating Kazantzakis’ work into German from a French text, almost word for word, which created significant problems in the smooth flow of dialogue and the precise rendering of meaning.
The costumes were designed by Gerda Schulte, one of Germany’s most remarkable and pioneering theatre costume designers during the first post-war decades. George Anemogiannis found the designs of the costumes while in Germany on holiday, when he visited the Theatre and Theatre Museum of Mannheim. Knowing that in 1954 Kazantzakis’ play had been performed there, he searched for relevant material and was able to acquire photographs, the program and reviews for the performance, along with Schulte’s contact details. As a fellow set designer, he contacted her and she quickly and gladly sent him the sketches of the costumes of the show, to enrich the collections of the Kazantzakis Museum that was still under establishment. These are the sketches of the costumes of the five main characters of the play, measuring 35cm X 23.5 cm, designed with bright colours on a black background. These drawings hold a special place in the history of the Museum, as they are the first designs of theatrical costumes acquired for the Theatre Archive of the Nikos Kazantzakis Museum.
More than forty years later, the Museum’s Theatrical Collection includes programs, posters, costume and set designs, 3D models, costumes from the performances of Nikos Kazantzakis’ plays or novels adapted for theatre, film, and television. The wealth of content of this collection, from Greece and abroad, is due to the capacity, the connections, and the research skills of the Museum’s founder, set and costume designer, George Anemogiannis.
9. Artefacts from the Spanish Civil War
Read more
In 1936, Spain was plunged into an abysmal civil war between the revolutionary Nationalists under the leadership of Francisco Franco and the coalition of democrats, communists, anarchists, and liberal forces of the Democratic government led by Manuel Azaña. The conflict ended in 1939 with the Nationalist faction dominating.
The Spanish Civil War has been described as the dress rehearsal of the coming Second World War or the “last romantic war”. New agencies from all over the world set up unprecedented information mechanisms and trusted its coverage to the best writers of the time. The Spanish Civil War gave journalism the opportunity to successfully identify with literature. On battlefields hosted great writers, such as Lorca, Orwell, Hemingway, Neruda, Saint-Exupéry, and, of course, our own Nikos Kazantzakis.
On 1 October 1936 the editor-in-chief of Kathimerini, Emilios Chourmouzios, telegraphed Kazantzakis as a matter of urgency, asking him to assume the role of the newspaper’s authorized correspondent for the Spanish Civil War. Kazantzakis agreed immediately. This collaboration between Kazantzakis and Kathimerini, a conservative newspaper, in the midst of the Metaxas regime that sends Kazantzakis on the side of the Nationalists, accompanied by an “official representative”, has been widely discussed at times. However, the instruction given by Chourmouzios to Kazantzakis was to “tell the truth” and Kazantzakis would fully justify his trust.
The mission began on 2 October with Kazantzakis following the march of nationalist troops toward central and northern Spain, and it ended on 19 November. In early November, Kazantzakis was located 13 km outside Madrid in the city of Getafe, next to the “Hill of the Angels”, the geographical centre of the Iberian Peninsula. He wandered onto the battlefield and that is where the month’s Hidden Gems come from.
They are “the ‘Spanish gifts’ that never left us,” as Eleni Kazantzaki said. Two of them adorn the Permanent Exhibition of the Nikos Kazantzakis Museum and are exhibited in the travel section. One is a photograph of two young children, a boy and a girl, on the back of which Kazantzakis has noted in red pencil: “5 Nov 1936. I found them in trenches of Getafe the day after the Nationalists took it, in a cloak”. The other is a red bloodied flag that Kazantzakis pulled from the coat of a dead soldier of the Democrats.
War is not just weapons. It is also the personal stories of people, the unknown small moments and the love that is shattered in the abyss of violence, the unobserved human dramas that are passed by major historical events. The lives trying to go on, the faces with expressions that characterize entire eras, and the people who are there to record them. These people include Nikos Kazantzakis.
10. Portrait-Sketch of Kazantzakis by Fotis Kontoglou
Read more
Full-length portrait of Nikos Kazantzakis signed by Fotis Kontoglou and dated 1922. Kazantzakis is depicted walking in a garden, with a book under arm. The work is a sketch, pen on aquarelle paper, and uses as inspiration a photo of Kazantzakis in Kifissia in 1921.
The back side of the piece has the following handwritten dedication by the artist Fotis Kontoglou, with characteristic humility, to the author: “Mr. Kazantzakis, I salute you. Accept this small drawing as a minuscule tribute of appreciation, for which I may not be completely worthy. Fotis Kontoglou.”
Nikos Kazantzakis had met Fotis Kontoglou and they developed friendly ties. Kazantzakis appreciated Kontoglou’s work and had tried to help him. His appreciation of Kontoglou is also illustrated by the article titled ‘Mortals and Immortals’ which he dedicated to him fifteen years later, in his series of travel impressions in Morias, published by Kathimerini newspaper in 1937. Kazantzakis had met Kontoglou at work in Mystras, when he was conserving Byzantine frescoes in the church of the Monastery of Panagia Perivleptou. Kontoglou had worked during the 1930s as a conservator and in the years 1936-1938, and in Mystras, with s professional sensitivity that could be compared to the current principles of monument conservation.
Fotis Kontoglou (1895 – 1965) was a very important exponent of modern ecclesiastical painting in Greece. At the same time, besides being a hagiographer and a iconography conservator, he was also a painter and a writer. He was born in Aivali, Asia Minor, his father’s surname was Apostolelis, but he retained that of his mother, as he had lost his father as an infant. In 1913 he began studying at the Athens School of Fine Arts, the following year he went to France, and then returned to Aivali in 1919. With the Asia Minor Catastrophe in 1922, he came to Greece as a refugee and settled in Athens. During the 1950s his artistic career peaked, and he undertook the decoration of several churches, mainly in Athens.
11. Full-length Kazantzakis terracotta figure
Read more
This full-length terracotta figure depicts the author standing, hands together, just below his chest. In his left hand he holds his pipe. It is 34 cm tall and was crafted by Frosso Efthymiadi in 1945.
Kazantzakis is presented without glasses and a moustache. Indeed, that year he had shaved his moustache, as we see in photographs of the period. In fact, compared with an indicative photograph from the mission of the Central Committee for the Verification of German Atrocities in Crete in the summer of 1945, the work attributes the basic figure, measurements, and clothing characteristics of the author with remarkable accuracy.
Frosso Efthymiadi – Menegaki (1916 – 1995) was a sculptor and a ceramics artist, awarded in 1974 by the Academy of Athens for her artistic work. She was the first woman to be elected a member of the Academy of Athens in 1980. She studied alongside major artists in Vienna and Paris, and travelled to many countries around the globe to study art and learn more about art. Her work has been presented in exhibitions in Greece and abroad. She met Nikos Kazantzakis at a young age and photographs from her visit to Aegina in 1937 are preserved.
1945 was an important year for Nikos Kazantzakis. Residing mainly in Athens, he developed political activity that led to the establishment of the Socialist Workers Union. At the same time, he ran for a vacant post in the Athens Academy of Letters, but he was two votes short. In the summer, he took part in a crucial government mission, in the Central Committee for the Verification of German Atrocities in Crete, along with professors Ioannis Kalitsounakis and Yiannis Kakridis, and photographer Kostas Koutoulakis. On 11 November he married Eleni Samiou with Angelos and Anna Sikelianos as best man and woman. On 26 November he was sworn in as a Minister without portfolio of the Sofoulis government.
12. Photo album with Nikos Kazantzakis in 1945 in Crete.
Read more
Handwritten album by photographer Kostas Koutoulakis, entitled “Kazantzakis in Crete – Cazantzakis en Crète”. The cover is also inscribed “Photos Costas Coutoulakis – Athenes” and dated 1945.
The album contains five selected photographs depicting Nikos Kazantzakis during the mission of the Central Committee for Findings of Cruelty to Crete in the summer of that year. The photos are accompanied by handwritten captions by the photographer.
Along with Nikos Kazantzakis, university Professors Ioannis Kalitsounakis and Yiannis Kakridis participated in the Committee, as well as Kostas Koutoulakis as a photographer. The Commission toured Crete from the area of Chania in the west to the Monastery of Toplou on the eastern border of Megalonis, documenting atrocities committed by the Axis occupation forces during the years 1941 – 1945.
The photos in the album present illustrative images of the daily life of the mission, such as the recording of notes from Nazi atrocities in Ano Meros Amario and Agia Chania.
However, this album was not given to Nikos Kazantzakis in 1945, but eleven years later, as the accompanying letter sent by Kostas Koutoulakis to the author on July 1, 1956 informs us.
Specifically, he states that he is sending him “a small album with a few photos I took”. The letter was sent from Kritsa Lasithiou, the photographer’s hometown. During that time, in fact, filming had begun in the settlement of the adaptation of Nikos Kazantzakis’ novel “Christ Recrucified” into Gilles Dassin’s film “Celui qui doit mourir”, starring Melina Merkouri. Koutoulakis would become the photographer of her film shoots.
