Greece: A Traveler's Literary Companion (Traveler's Literary Companions) Paperback – March 1, 1997

Definitely has some British bias that Greeks would disagree with or even find offensive. Rather dry. Thomas Cahill's "Sailing the Wine Dark Sea" is a much better choice.

I bought this book as a gift for my Mother. She is planing a trip to Greece for next year. This book is walking her through everything from food, to hotels, to all the attractions one must see while there. A perfect gift!

Didn't find it particular valuable when traveling to Greece. Would not consider is essential as a travelers guide rather just good airplane material for local Greece short stories

Ah yes.

Artemis Leontis deserves a lot of credit for compiling these twenty-four short pieces of prose transaltion. Among them we find selections by Elytis, Seferis, and Kazantzakis, but also some stunningly attractive pieces by other less well-known names. The editor says in her introduction that collections of contemporary Greek prose in English translation are scarce. If that is true, it's a real pity, because most of these selections are gems of the short story form and those that are not fiction are laden with ideas and forms of expression that dazzle one with their originality, grasp of history, and understanding of life. Elli Alexiou takes us back to the unfortunate exchange of populations between Greece and Turkey and shows us people of both ethnicities who were neighbors and friends and loved and respected one another. They say good bye at the dock knowing they will never see each other again, and they promise to write. The narrator's mother promises to take good care of the grave in which the Turkish family has buried their little son. She writes every now and then to tell them how the flowers around the grave blossom each year in due season. When the Turkish cemetery is bulldozed to make way for an apartment complex, she doesn't have the heart to tell them so, and keeps on writing year after year that the grave is still beautiful. Eugenia Fakinou looks at the City of Athens and the first day in a big city school through the eyes of a little girl who has been transplanted from the Island of Symi. Supposing, correctly, that the reader can interpret the experience for himself, the writer limits herself to recording the child's impressions and perceptions. Beautifully done. Dimitris Hatzis tells us about a tanner in Yioannina who slowly and painfully comes to realize that he himself is not necessarily a failure, but that the times have changed along with technologies and viewpoints and he has no choice but to make necessary adjustments. In the offerings by the three well known writers mentioned above, there are quite a few quotable sentences that make the reader stop and consider why and in what sense they express deep truth. All these selections are beautiful. They explore various apects of modern Greek life, urban and rural, and they examine, poetically, what most readers will acknowledge to be universal human values. For future editions, the editor might consider changing the books's title. As it is now, it gives the impression of being a guide book, while in fact it is something much more important, namely, a literary treasure trove.

For a gift but looks interesting :)

This book will interest those who already know Greece and its recent history reasonably well. It would be less worthwhile if you are fairly new to the subject. I enjoyed most, but certainly not all, stories. I particularly liked "Astradeni", "The White Bear" and "Sioulas the Tanner". Whereas "Funerary Epigrams", "The Fresco" and "Black and White" were rather lost on me. But most of the stories said something worthwhile about time, place or customs. The stories cover a wide-ranging set of topics, so some may find the stories a bit disparate. But hopefully there is something for everyone. The only major criticism is that the categorisation into specific island groups and mainland regions is weak. There's not a broad enough coverage of individual places to make this worthwhile. At best it could have been ordered simply into "islands" and "mainland". But it could equally have been done differently such as history, customs, people etc. Nevertheless, it has given me a taster of individual authors, many of which I wouldn't otherwise have seen translated into English. I will try to follow up on some individual authors in future.

We bought this book for a visit to Crete but ended up not packing it! It proved too general and did not inspire or educate. However, Crete is great with or without this book.