Odysseas Elytis

Odysseas Elytis was a Greek poet, essayist, and translator, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1979. He was born in Heraklion, Crete, in 1911, to a wealthy family of soap manufacturers. He studied law at the University of Athens, but soon abandoned his studies to pursue his passion for poetry. He was influenced by the French surrealists, especially Paul Éluard, and by the Greek poetic tradition, especially Constantine Cavafy. He published his first collection of poems, Orientations, in 1939, and gained recognition as a leading figure of the Generation of the '30s, a group of modernist poets who sought to renew Greek poetry. During World War II, he served as a second lieutenant in the Greek army, and witnessed the horrors of the Nazi occupation and the Greek Civil War. His experiences inspired some of his most powerful poems, such as Heroic and Elegiac Song for the Lost Second Lieutenant of the Albanian Campaign (1943) and The Axion Esti (1959), which is considered his masterpiece and was set to music by Mikis Theodorakis. Elytis also traveled extensively in Europe and America, and became acquainted with many prominent artists and writers, such as Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, and T.S. Eliot. He was a prolific writer, producing many collections of poetry, such as Six and One Remorses for the Sky (1946), The Light Tree and the Fourteenth Beauty (1972), and The Elegies of Oxopetra (1991), as well as essays, translations, and anthologies. He also worked as a radio and television director, and as a member of various cultural organizations. He received many honors and awards for his work, including the Greek State Prize for Poetry, the Order of the Phoenix, and the Nobel Prize in Literature, which he dedicated to the Greek people and their poetic tradition. He died of a heart attack in Athens in 1996, at the age of 84. His poetry is widely translated and admired for its lyrical beauty, metaphysical depth, and humanistic values.