Harvard Review is a biannual literary journal published by Houghton Library at Harvard University .
55-471: In 1986 Stratis Haviaras , curator of the Woodberry Poetry Room at Harvard University, founded a quarterly periodical called Erato . The first issue featured a poem by Seamus Heaney , a short piece on Louis Simpson , a news item from Harvard University Press , and three pages of book reviews. Within three years the book review section of Erato had grown to more than 30 pages and the publication
110-454: A "great writer" and "devotee of peace." Following the war, he was temporarily leader of a minor Greek leftist party, while in 1945 he was, among others, a founding member of the Greek-Soviet friendship union. While Kazantzakis was deeply spiritual, he often discussed his struggle with religious faith, specifically his Greek Orthodoxy. Baptized Greek Orthodox as a child, he was fascinated by
165-803: A Greek restaurant. At the University of Virginia, he met William Faulkner and worked with the young writer Richard Fariña , three years before his death. Haviaras first appeared in the Greek letters with the dramatic monologue "The Rusty Nail" (Kainouria Epochi, Summer 1959), later performed in The Actors Studio in New York. Upon his return to Greece in April 1961, he found work in the US Airbase in Athens. That same year he met
220-834: A Pulitzer Prize for Fiction; Arthur Miller , recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for Drama ; Joyce Carol Oates , recipient of a National Book Award for Fiction; Yusef Komunyakaa , winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry; Jorie Graham , recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry; David Mamet , recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for Drama; David Foster Wallace ; Gore Vidal ; Andrea Barrett ; and many other writers. Selections from Harvard Review have been anthologized in The PEN/O. Henry Prize Stories , The Best American Essays , The Best American Poetry , The Best American Short Stories , The Best American Mystery Sories , The Best American Nature and Science Writing , and The Pushcart Prize: Best of
275-488: A curse, Holy fathers, I give you a blessing: may your conscience be as clear as mine and may you be as moral and religious as I" (" Μου δώσατε μια κατάρα, Άγιοι πατέρες, σας δίνω κι εγώ μια ευχή: Σας εύχομαι να 'ναι η συνείδηση σας τόσο καθαρή, όσο είναι η δική μου και να 'στε τόσο ηθικοί και θρήσκοι όσο είμαι εγώ "). While the excommunication was rejected by the top leadership of the Orthodox Church, it became emblematic of
330-745: A draftsman in The Architects Collaborative (TAC), founded by Walter Gropius . There he met the architect Gail Flynn, whom he married in 1967. That year he moved with her to the United States. In Cambridge, Massachusetts, Haviaras worked as a clerk at Harvard’s Widener Library and joined The Committee for the Restoration of the Democratic Government in Greece , founded by members of the academic community. Soon he became editor and one of
385-508: A final journey after the end of the original poem. Following the structure of Homer's Odyssey , it is divided into 24 rhapsodies and consists of 33,333 lines. While Kazantzakis felt this poem held his cumulative wisdom and experience, and that it was his greatest literary experience, critics were split, "some praised it as an unprecedented epic, [while] many simply viewed it as a hybristic act," with many scholars still being split to this day. A common criticism of The Odyssey: A Modern Sequel
440-493: A high-value euro collectors' coin; the €10 Greek Nikos Kazantzakis commemorative coin , minted in 2007. His image is on the obverse of the coin, while the reverse carries the National Emblem of Greece , with his signature. Kazantzakis's first published work was the 1906 narrative, Serpent and Lily (Όφις και Κρίνο), which he signed with the pen name Karma Nirvami. In 1907 Kazantzakis went to Paris for his graduate studies and
495-560: A monthly publication. In 1971 Haviaras joined a think tank formed in Cambridge by members of the organization Δημοκρατική Άμυνα (Democratic Defense), which operated underground in Greece. As its representative from America, Haviaras travelled to Bonn, Germany in August of that year to participate in an international conference aimed at the restoration of democracy in Greece. While working at Harvard, Haviaras attended courses in literature and history at
550-604: A romantic relationship in 1928, though they were not married until 1945. Samiou helped Kazantzakis with his work, typing drafts, accompanying him on his travels, and managing his business affairs. They were married until his death in 1957. Samiou died in 2004. Between 1922 and his death in 1957, he sojourned in Paris and Berlin (from 1922 to 1924), Italy , Russia (in 1925), Spain (in 1932), and then later in Cyprus , Aegina , Egypt , Mount Sinai , Czechoslovakia , Nice (he later bought
605-610: A villa in nearby Antibes , in the Old Town section near the famed seawall), China , and Japan . While in Berlin, where the political situation was explosive, Kazantzakis discovered communism and became an admirer of Vladimir Lenin . He never became a committed communist but visited the Soviet Union and stayed with the Left Opposition politician and writer Victor Serge . He witnessed
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#1732851915840660-547: The Iliad . In 1945, he became the leader of a small party on the non-communist left, and entered the Greek government as Minister without Portfolio. He resigned this post the following year. In 1946, Kazantzakis became the head of the UNESCO Bureau of Translations, the organization which promoted translations of literary works. However, he resigned in 1947 to concentrate on writing, and indeed produced most of his literary output during
715-551: The Greek Civil War , gender roles, immigration, and general cultural practices and beliefs. These works also explore what Kazantzakis believed to be the unique physical and spiritual location of Greece, a nation that belongs to neither the East nor the West, an idea he put forth in many of his letters to friends. As the scholar Peter Bien argued, "Kazantzakis viewed Greece's special mission as
770-678: The University of Athens ; his 1906 Juris Doctor thesis was titled Ο Φρειδερίκος Νίτσε εν τη φιλοσοφία του δικαίου και της πολιτείας (" Friedrich Nietzsche on the Philosophy of Law and the State"). Then he went to the Sorbonne in 1907 to study philosophy. There he fell under the influence of Henri Bergson . His 1909 doctoral dissertation at the Sorbonne was a reworked version of his 1906 dissertation under
825-487: The lives of saints from a young age. As a young man he took a month long trip to Mount Athos , a monastic retreat and major spiritual center for Greek Orthodoxy. Most critics and scholars of Kazantzakis agree that the struggle to find truth in religion and spirituality was central to many of his works, and that some novels, like The Last Temptation of Christ and Christ Recrucified focus completely on questioning Christian morals and values . As he traveled Europe, he
880-447: The "frightfully urgent problems of the age in which we are living." He saw the need for socialist parties throughout the world to put aside their bickering and unite so that the program of " socialist democracy " could prevail not just in Greece but throughout the civilized world. He described socialism as a social system that "does not permit the exploitation of one person by another" and that "must guarantee every freedom." Kazantzakis
935-558: The American press, and were translated into many languages. He also founded and edited the literary journals Arion’s Dolphin, Erato and Harvard Review. Haviaras’s parents were refugees from Asia Minor who settled in Nea Kios (Argos) when it was founded in 1927. As a child he experienced the horrors of World War II. When he was 9, the Nazis executed his father, Christos, for his participation in
990-613: The Athens journal Ta Poetika and his short stories and memoir e s in oanagnostis.gr an e-magazine for the book, of whose editorial board he was a member. Haviaras was the translator into English of C.P. Cavafy The Canon (Hermes Publishing 2000, Center for Hellenic Studies, Harvard University Press, 2007 ) and collaborated with others in the translation of works by Seamus Heaney and Charles Simic into Greek. Nikos Kazantzakis Nikos Kazantzakis ( Greek : Νίκος Καζαντζάκης [ˈnikos kazanˈd͡zacis] ; 2 March ( OS 18 February) 1883 – 26 October 1957)
1045-635: The English-speaking world due to cinematic adaptations of Zorba the Greek (1964) and The Last Temptation of Christ (1988). He also translated a number of notable works into Modern Greek , such as the Divine Comedy , Thus Spoke Zarathustra , On the Origin of Species , and Homer 's Iliad and Odyssey . Kazantzakis was born in the town of Kandiye (now Heraklion ) in Crete , with origins from
1100-864: The Greek language with AXNA, a novel (Kedros, 2014) and the teaching of creative writing at the European Center for the Translation of Literature (EKEMEL), of which he was President in 2000, and the National Book Center of Greece (EKEBI). He also served as Vice President of the Greek Authors Society (2011–2013), and since 2015 he coordinated a creative writing workshop at the Center for Hellenic Studies of Harvard University in Nafplion, Greece. Since 2013 he had been publishing poems and translations of poetry in
1155-478: The Poetry and Farnsworth Rooms, Haviaras was responsible for selecting works of poetry from the English-speaking world and making studio recordings of poets reading from their own work. Equally importantly, he organized weekly gatherings, book presentations, poetry readings and publications. In 1984 and for the next 24 years he taught a successful novel-writing workshop at Harvard’s summer program, and with his assistant,
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#17328519158401210-645: The Small Presses . In 2009 Harvard Review launched an online edition of the journal. Stratis Haviaras Stratis Haviaras (June 28, 1935 – March 3, 2020) was a bilingual writer of literary works in English and Greek, known in the U.S. for his novels When the Tree Sings (shortlisted for the Natiοnal Book Award and named an ALA Notable book), and The Heroic Age . Both were critically acclaimed in
1265-509: The author, Katerina Plassara, with whom he traveled to France, Germany and Scandinavia, writing plays. In 1963 he published his first collection of poems, Η κυρία με την πυξίδα (Lady with a Compass) and for the next few years he worked as a supervising engineer in the construction of the Achelous River hydroelectric dam. His second book of poetry, Βερολίνο (Berlin), was published in 1965. During Greece’s political turmoil, which culminated in
1320-657: The expense of the Chinese government he was transported first to Copenhagen and then to Freiburg . His gangrene was cured but he had contracted a severe form of Asian flu in China, which eventually led to his death. Kazantzakis died on 26 October 1957 in Freiburg, Germany , at age 74. He is buried at the highest point of the Walls of Heraklion, the Martinengo Bastion , looking out over
1375-843: The last ten years of his life. In 1946, The Society of Greek Writers recommended that Kazantzakis and Angelos Sikelianos be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature . In 1957, he lost the Prize to Albert Camus by a single vote. Camus later said that Kazantzakis deserved the honour "a hundred times more" than himself. In total, Kazantzakis was nominated in nine different years. Late in 1957, even though suffering from leukemia , Kazantzakis set out on one last trip to China and Japan. According to one theory, while in China Kazantzakis had to be vaccinated, possibly due to symptoms of smallpox and cholera . The vaccine, however, caused him gangrene and at
1430-473: The literary world was his acquaintance, starting in 1957, with Kimon Friar , a distinguished translator into English of The Odyssey: a Modern Sequel by Nikos Kazantzakis , whom he met in Athens. Recognizing Haviaras’s passion for literature and writing, Friar invited him to travel to the United States to assist him in the translation of Kazantzakis’s Salvatores Dei: Spiritual exercises , and reading of essays on US arts over The Voice of America radio, and in
1485-687: The majority of "serious" Greek artistic work was written in Katharevousa , a "pure" form of the Greek language that was created to bridge Ancient Greek with Modern, Demotic Greek , in order to "purify" Demotic Greek. The use of Demotic, among writers, gradually started to gain the upper hand only at the turn of the 20th century, under the influence of the New Athenian School (or Palamian). In his letters to friends and correspondents, Kazantzakis wrote that he chose to write in Demotic Greek to capture
1540-453: The majority of Christian writers focus on God's immutability, Jesus' deity, and our salvation through God's grace, Kazantzakis emphasized divine mutability, Jesus' humanity, and God's own redemption through our effort," highlighting Kazantzakis's uncommon interpretation of traditional Orthodox Christian beliefs. Many Orthodox Church clergy condemned Kazantzakis's work and a campaign was started to excommunicate him. His reply was: "You gave me
1595-475: The military takeover of the government in April, 1967 , Haviaras participated in pro-democracy rallies in Athens (and later in Cambridge, Massachusetts). His next collection of poems Η νύχτα του ξυλοπόδαρου (Night of the Stiltwalker), amply reflects his opposition to totalitarian rule – it was confiscated by the police soon after it appeared in the bookstores. In Athens, in the autumn of 1966 Haviaras found work as
1650-403: The mountains and sea of Crete . His epitaph reads "I hope for nothing. I fear nothing. I am free." ( Δεν ελπίζω τίποτα. Δε φοβούμαι τίποτα. Είμαι λέφτερος. ) Kazantzakis developed this famously pithy phrasing of the philosophical ideal of cynicism , which dates back to at least the second century CE. The 50th anniversary of the death of Nikos Kazantzakis was selected as the main motif for
1705-443: The peasants he encountered when traveling Greece. Bien asserts that, since Kazantzakis was trying to preserve the language of the people, he used their local metaphors and phrases to give his narrative an air of authenticity and preserve these phrases so that they were not lost. Throughout his life, Kazantzakis reiterated his belief that "only socialism as the goal and democracy as the means" could provide an equitable solution to
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1760-409: The persistent disapprobation from many Christian authorities for his political and religious views. Modern scholarship tends to dismiss the idea that Kazantzakis was being sacrilegious or blasphemous with the content of his novels and beliefs. These scholars argue that, if anything, Kazantzakis was acting in accordance to a long tradition of Christians who publicly struggled with their faith, and grew
1815-425: The philosophy of Nietzsche , Buddhist theology, and communist ideology as major influences. While he continued to travel later in life, the bulk of his travel writing came from this time period. Kazantzakis began writing The Odyssey: A Modern Sequel in 1924, and completed it in 1938 after fourteen years of writing and revision. The poem follows the hero of Homer 's Odyssey , Odysseus , as he undertakes
1870-427: The poet Michael Milburn, he edited and published large selections from sound recordings ( Vladimir Nabokov at Harvard and Seamus Heaney at Harvard ), and the literary magazine ERATO. In 1992 he launched Harvard Review , a major publishing effort, now edited by Christina Thompson and associates. After completing 40 years of service at the University, a fund for an annual poetry lecture to honor Stratis Haviaras
1925-458: The reconciliation of Eastern instinct with Western reason," echoing the Bergsonian themes that balance logic against emotion found in many of Kazantzakis's novels. Two of these works of fiction, Zorba the Greek and The Last Temptation of Christ had major motion picture adaptations in 1964 and 1988 respectively. During the time when Kazantzakis was writing his novels, poems, and plays,
1980-510: The resistance, while his mother, Georgia Hatzikyriakos, was sent to a concentration camp in Germany. Subsequently the family house was demolished by the occupying forces. After finishing grammar school, Haviaras started working in the construction trades. In battling the twin obstacles of Attention Deficit Disorder and dyslexia, his love for writing found ways to persevere. He began to write poems and plays at age 13. A milestone in his engagement with
2035-521: The rise of Joseph Stalin , and became disillusioned with Soviet-style communism . Around this time, his earlier nationalist beliefs were gradually replaced by a more universalist ideology. As a journalist, in 1926 he interviewed prime minister of Spain Miguel Primo de Rivera and the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini . During WWII, he was in Athens, where he and the philologist Ioannis Kakridis translated
2090-516: The speakers of its Sunday program, The Voice of Greece, broadcasting over WILD Radio Boston against the military dictatorship in Greece. Following a complaint by “Twenty Greek-American businessmen,” the Federal Communications Commission imposed the submission of translated texts from Greek to English and vice versa 96 hours before broadcasting, in essence silencing the program. The Committee continued its activities with Eleutheria ,
2145-573: The spirit of the people and to make his writing resonate with the common Greek citizen. Moreover, he wanted to prove that the common spoken language of Greek was able to produce artistic, literary works. "Why not show off all the possibilities of Demotic Greek?" he argued. Furthermore, Kazantzakis felt that it was important to record the vernacular of the everyday person, including Greek peasants, and often tried to include expressions, metaphors, and idioms he would hear while traveling throughout Greece and incorporate them into his writing for posterity. At
2200-518: The time of writing, some scholars and critics condemned his work because it was not written in Katharevousa, while others praised it precisely because it was written in Demotic Greek. Several critics have argued that Kazantzakis's writing was too flowery, filled with obscure metaphors, and difficult to read despite being written in Demotic Greek. Kazantzakis scholar Peter Bien argues that the metaphors and language Kazantzakis used were taken directly from
2255-556: The title Friedrich Nietzsche dans la philosophie du droit et de la cité ("Friedrich Nietzsche on the Philosophy of Right and the State"). Upon his return to Greece, he began translating works of philosophy. In 1914, he met the writer Angelos Sikelianos . Together they travelled for two years through places where Greek Orthodox Christian culture flourished, largely due to the enthusiastic nationalism of Sikelianos. Kazantzakis married Galateia Alexiou in 1911; they divorced in 1926. Kazantzakis met Eleni Samiou (Helen) in 1924. They began
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2310-604: The typing of archival material. Through Friar, Haviaras met Arthur Miller and Marilyn Monroe , Tennessee Williams , William Inge , among others. During his stay in the U.S. he also studied mechanical drawing at the Manhattan Technological Institute in New York, and machine design at the Jefferson School of Commerce in Charlottesville, Virginia, where he lived with relatives, working in the evenings in
2365-451: The university’s evening and summer programs. He completed his undergraduate and postgraduate studies in literature and creative writing respectively (BA 1973, MFA 1976) at the low residency program of Goddard College in Vermont. At Goddard he met many writers, including Raymond Carver , John Irving , and Richard Ford , and he launched Arion's Dolphin, a hand-stitched poetry journal. 1973
2420-499: The village of Myrtia . Crete had not yet joined the modern Greek state (which had been established in 1832), and was still under the rule of the Ottoman Empire . Based on family records, Kazantzakis was born on 18 February 1883 ( OS ), in contrast to the census of Heraklion which listed his birthyear as 1881; this discrepancy was settled by Kazantzakis himself in one of his epistles. From 1902 to 1906 Kazantzakis studied law at
2475-761: Was a Greek writer, journalist, politician, poet and philosopher. Widely considered a giant of modern Greek literature , he was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in nine different years, and remains the most translated Greek author worldwide. Kazantzakis's novels included Zorba the Greek (published in 1946 as Life and Times of Alexis Zorbas ), Christ Recrucified (1948), Captain Michalis (1950, translated as Freedom or Death ), and The Last Temptation of Christ (1955). He also wrote plays , travel books , memoirs, and philosophical essays, such as The Saviors of God: Spiritual Exercises . His fame spread in
2530-566: Was a landmark year for his literary career. He began writing in English, and many of his poems appeared in literary journals such as Iowa Review, Ploughshares, Dickinson Review, and Kayak. In 1976 his first poetry collection in English, Crossing the River Twice was published by the Cleveland State University Poetry Center. At Harvard he was successively promoted to positions of greater responsibility until in 1974 he
2585-541: Was aimed at Kazantzakis's over-reliance on flowery and metaphorical verse, a criticism that is also aimed at his works of fiction. Many of Kazantzakis's most famous novels were published between 1940 and 1961, including Zorba the Greek (1946), Christ Recrucified (1948), Captain Michalis (1953), The Last Temptation of Christ (1955), and Report to Greco (1961). Scholar Peter Bien argues that each story explores different aspects of post-World War II Greek culture such as religion, nationalism, political beliefs,
2640-591: Was anathema to the right-wing in Greece both before and after World War II. The right waged war against his books and called him "immoral" and a " Bolshevik troublemaker" and accused him of being a "Russian agent". He was also distrusted by both the Communist Party of Greece and the Soviet Union as a " bourgeois " thinker. However, upon his death in 1957, he was honored by the Chinese Communist Party as
2695-656: Was appointed Curator of the Woodberry Poetry Room and the Henry Weston Farnsworth Room, two specialized collections in the Harvard College Library system. In 1976 Haviaras began to live with Heather Cole, a librarian at Harvard. The couple was married in 1990 at the suggestion of their daughter, Elektra Haviaras (b. 1981). In 1979, Simon & Schuster published his novels When the Tree Sings and in 1984, The Heroic Age . As Curator of
2750-485: Was appointed editor. Contributors to Harvard Review have included John Ashbery , recipient of a National Book Award and a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry ; Paul Harding , recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction ; Jhumpa Lahiri , recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction; Rita Dove , winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry; Charles Yu , winner of the National Book Award for Fiction ; John Updike , recipient of
2805-417: Was deeply influenced by the philosophy of Henri Bergson , primarily the idea that a true understanding of the world comes from the combination of intuition, personal experience, and rational thought. The theme of rationalism mixed with irrationality later became central to many of Kazantzakis's later stories, characters, and personal philosophies. Later, in 1909, he wrote a one-act play titled Comedy , which
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#17328519158402860-511: Was established in the Department of English and American Literature and Language by a grant from film maker Robert Gardner and a donation from the poet Elizabeth Gray. Haviaras retired from the library at Harvard in the year 2000 but continued to teach in the Summer Program until 2008, completing 40 years of service, when he took up permanent residence in Athens. As a writer, he returned to
2915-957: Was filled with existential themes, predating the post-World War II existentialist movement in Europe spearheaded by writers like Jean-Paul Sartre and Camus. After completing his studies in Paris, he wrote the tragedy, "The Master Builder" ( Ο Πρωτομάστορας ), based on a popular Greek folkloric myth. Through the next several decades, from the 1910s through the 1930s, Kazantzakis traveled around Greece, much of Europe, northern Africa, and to several countries in Asia . Countries he visited include: Germany, Italy, France, The Netherlands, Romania, Egypt, Russia, Japan, and China, among others. These journeys put Kazantzakis in contact with different philosophies, ideologies, lifestyles, and people, all of which influenced him and his writings. Kazantzakis would often write about his influences in letters to friends, citing Sigmund Freud ,
2970-647: Was influenced by various philosophers, cultures, and religions, like Buddhism, causing him to question his Christian beliefs. While never claiming to be an atheist , his public questioning and critique put him at odds with some in the Greek Orthodox Church and many of his critics. Scholars theorize that Kazantzakis's difficult relationship with many members of the clergy and with more religiously conservative literary critics, came from his questioning. In his book Broken Hallelujah: Nikos Kazantzakis and Christian Theology , author Darren Middleton theorizes that, "Where
3025-452: Was renamed Harvard Book Review . In 1992 Haviaras relaunched the publication as Harvard Review , a perfect-bound journal of approximately 200 pages, featuring poetry, fiction, and literary criticism, published semi-annually by the Harvard College Library. In 2000 Haviaras retired from Harvard University and Christina Thompson (formerly the editor of the Australian journal Meanjin )
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