1925. January 1-3. Excursion to Vorous village, to Vrontisi Monastery at Zaros, to villages Nivritos, Gergeri, Panassos, Aghia Varvara.
The whole winter, Odyssey1. He composes rhapsodes Α-Ζ.
July. He returns to Athens, and from there he goes to Aegina for a few days; he is drawn to the island for permanent residence.
August 9-September 17. He sojourns on the Cyclades Islands. Tinos, Myconos, Syros; Naxos (Aug. 14-19): “I found houses in which we had lived [in 1897-99], the one in ruins, old friends, sorrow and grief”. On Aug. 19 he leaves for Amorgos and lodges in the house of Margioritsa Syrigou. On Sept. 9 Eleni Samiou goes to meet him. K. translates a novel by Tagore (which one, I do not know). On the 17th of that month, they return to Athens.
October 13. He departs for the Soviet Union as a correspondent of the Athenian newspaper Eleftheros Logos.2 He stays in Odessa for a few days.
November-December. Moscow. (His impressions are published in the Athen. newsp. Eleftheros Logos, Nov.-Dec.)
1926. January 1-4. Leningrad.
January 5-25. Moscow.
In his Diary (from Nov. 5, 1925-Jan. 25, 1926) K. has noted in detail how he expended his time. The main path on which he traveled is worth recording, as it reveals the nature of his interest in the new Russia: Dance School. Revolutionary Theater. School of Technology. Meyerhold Theater. Visit to the prisons. Children’s Theater. Tcheka. School of Irma Duncan. Ministry of Social Welfare and Public Health. Museum of French Painting Masters. Theater: Princess Turandot. Hebrew Theater. Museum of Theater. Museum of Byzantine Icons. Holy Liturgy at the Cathedral. Hebrew Theater. Kremlin. Children’s Theater. At Meyerhold’s house. At Meyerhold’s rehearsals: Revizor. Museum of the Revolution. Kamerni theater: Salome. Official opening of the central electric power station in Kiatoura. Speech by Trotsky. Two schools. Exhibition of the Historical Museum for the evolution of science and workmanship in Sov. Russia. Gynaecological Clinic. Gallery Morozov. Imperial Treasury (Crown jewels). School in the forest. Ars Asiatica Museum. People’s kitchens. Tolstoy Museum. Dostoyevsky Museum. Porcelain Museum. Restoration of Icons Workshop. Two hours with Anna Lunacharskaya. Historical Museum: Iconography. Byzantine Library. Visit to the sculptor Youkov. Theater Tairov. Interview with Tairov. At the Cinema: Potemkin. Juvenile Asylum for vagrant children. Dramatized tribunal in a campaign (propaganda) for rules of hygiene. At the Circus with Lunacharskaya and Êtienne Lacoste. Meyerhold Theater: Roar, China! Troitsky Monastery, etc.
January 25. He departs for Greece.
February 5. He arrives in Athens. He settles in 59, Ermou Str., home of his sister, Eleni Theodosiadis. (His divorce with Mrs. Galatea was issued by the appropriate court on April 28, 1926.)
April 25-June 3. He travels to Palestine and Cyprus with Eleni Samiou and Kaitie and Marika Papaioannou. They board the ship “Naxos”. Jaffa, Jerusalem, Hospice “Casa Nova”), Bethleem, Hebron, Dead Sea, Jericho, Tel-Aviv, Haifa, Beirut, (Apr. 28-May 17). During his stay in Palestine he is reunited with two of his Jewish friends from Germany: Elsa Lange and Lia Lewin (maiden name: Dunkelblumen)3. On May 18 he departs for Cyprus with his three traveling companions; Famagusta, Nicosia, Larnaca, Limassol, Paphos, Platres. Interview with the exiled King of Hejaz on May 24. On the 31st they board the Italian ship “Gianicolo” for Piraeus. K’s impressions are published in the Athen. newspaper Eleftheros Typos4 (May 9-10, June 13-22, July 18). Eleni Samiou also chronicled their voyage through the columns of newspaper Kathimerini.5
July. He vacations in Tsagarada with Eleni Samiou and her sisters Anna and Poly.
August-September. Journey to Spain. Interview with Primo de Rivera.
October. Rome. Eleni travels to meet him. Interview with Mussolini. Assisi.
November 12. The author of this Biographical Timeline meets K. for the first time in Athens.
December. The Athen. newsp. Eleftheros Typos6 publishes K.’s impressions from Spain (December 12, 1926-January 7, 1927).
On the last days of December, K. departs for Egypt and Sinai with the painter Takis Kalmouchos. The Athen. magaz. Anagennisi8 publishes (Dec. 1926) some verses – the first samples of writing – from the Odyssey.8
1927. January-February. Egypt-Sinai. (K. stays in Sinai for a fortnight)
February. The newspaper Eleftheros Typos9 publishes K.’s impressions of fascist Italy (Febr. 6-28).
April. The newspaper Eleftheros Logos10 publishes K.’s impressions of Egypt and Sinai (Apr. 3-May 3).
May 19. He settles in Aegina, in the home of Pavlos Hanos, and devotes himself in the writing of his Odyssey.11
July-August. The Athenian magazine Anagennisi12 publishes The Saviors of God13 (no. 11 and 12, pp. 599-631). (It also circulated as a reprint.)
July 24-25. Excursion to the Peloponnese with two friends.14 September 22. K. completes his Odyssey (Rhapsodes 7-24). In his diary he notes: “Intense, grand labor: Odyssey. Never in my life have I worked in such rhythms. I completed the Odyssey. Arriving on Sunday: Ellie Lambridis and P. Prevelakis.”
End of September-beginning of October. Still in Aegina. He authors several dozens of articles for the Eleftheroudakis [Encyclopedic] Dictionary15 (not only those which bear his initials), and at the same time, he works on a selection from his traveling pages, which comprised the volume: Journeying – Spain, Italy, Egypt, Sinai, Publ. “Serapeion”16 Alexandria, 1927.
October 20. He departs again for Russia, this time invited by the Soviet Government.
25: Odessa. 27: Moscow (Grand Hôtel, Room No. 538).
October 27-November 17. Moscow. I copy selected passages from his Diary of some of his activities (some of which also appear in his texts): “Blue Blouse Theater”. Discussion with a young Jewish student, Bella Grigorievna Orkin. Morozov Gallery. Acquaintance with the Japanese author Akita. Kamerny Theater: Day-Night operetta. Stanislavsky Theater: Eugene Onegin. Lenin Mausoleum. Theater: L’Affaire… He watches the grand parade in the Red Square on the anniversary of the Revolution. He is acquainted with Charles Rappoport, Henri Barbusse, Klara Zetkin, Käthe Kollwitz, Arthur Holitscher... He finds again his Jewish friend Itka Horowitz (destined to have a horrible end during the Stalin years of terror). K. notes: “Itka = marxistische Abteilung meiner Seele”17. He speaks at the great pacifist convention. On November 13 he is acquainted with Panait Istrati: “We decided, both of us, to stay in Russia.”
November 17. Some guests of the Soviet Government depart from Moscow by train for a quick tour of Caucasus: K., Istrati, Arthur Holitscher, Helen Stœcker (Κ. has dedicated Toda-Raba18 to her in 1934), Prof. Kouchinsky, Belgian doctor Sœur, the Japanese poet Akita and the Argentinean author Kintana. The journey’s stations: Kharkov – Rostov – Baku – Tbilisi – Batum – Poti – Gagri – Novorossiysk – Rostov – Moscow (Dec. 3).
December 7. K. leaves Moscow for Kiev, where he rejoins Istrati. They have decided to collaborate politically and auctorially. On Dec. 22 they leave Odessa for Greece. Dec. 29: Thessalonica. Dec. 30: Athens. K. introduces Istrati to the Greek public with an article in the Athenian newspaper Proia19 (Dec. 31, 1927).
The Athenian Publishing House “Stochastis”20 publishes the tragedy Nikeforos Fokas.21
1928. January 11. K. and Istrati speak about the Soviet Union to a sizeable gathering at the “Alambra” Theater, organized by Demetris Glinos. (K’s speech was archived in Anagennisi,22 Β΄ 193-198.) Newspaper Proia23 also publishes K.’s impressions of the Soviet Union. (Jan. 8-14). A judicial interrogation ensues, which forces the two companions to suspend their political action. Istrati retreats to Kifissia, K. to Aegina (Pavlos Hanos’s home). The trial for the “Alambra” gathering is set for April 3d (but it is postponed several times and is finally cancelled).
April 19. K. departs again for Russia to reunite with Istrati. On the 24th of this month they meet in Kiev. K. stays there alone until June 4th. During this time, he authors a screenplay for the Russian cinema with a topic from the Greek Revolution of 1821, entitled: The Red Kerchief.
June 7. The two friends lodge in a country house in Bekovo, near Moscow (Dacha Arkhipova, 8, Ulitsa Karl Marx)24. On June 8 he meets Gorky for the first time (in Moscow). K. revises “The Saviors of God”.25 He adds the chapter “Silence”,26 where he proclaims total nihilism (which, however, does not lead to the renouncement of action). He writes several articles for “Pravda”27 (about the social condition of Greece) and a new screenplay: “Lenin”.
June 22. K. and Istrati go to Leningrad for a few days. First meeting of K. with Victor Serge and poet Nikolai Klyuev.
July 17. K., Istrati and Istrati’s companion Bilili Baud-Bovy set off from Moscow for a ten-day railroad journey up to Murmansk (at the North Arctic Ocean).
July 23. The Parisian magazine “Monde” of H. Barbusse publishes Istrati’s article: «Parmi les gueux de Grèce: Nikos Kazantsaki» (sic)28, which could be regarded as the first introduction of K. to the French readers. (The same text was also published, slightly modified, in Istrati’s book: Vers l’autre flamme,29 Publ. Rieder, Paris, 1929.)
August 7-15. K. authors in Bekovo one more screenplay: “St. Pahomios and Company”,30 and several articles for Russian magazines. Eleni Samiou comes from Paris to meet him.
August 28. K., Istrati, Eleni Samiou and Bilili Baud-Bovy set off from Moscow for a long journey to South Russia. The two friends intend to co-write a series of articles for the world press under the general title: “Following the red star”.31 The same material would also comprise a three-volume book, which would be published by the Parisian publisher Rieder. The journey’s stations: Nizhny Novgorod – Kazan – Samara – Saratov – Stalingrad – Astrakhan – Baku –Tbilisi (here, K. sees again his old friend, Barbara Nikolaevna) – Borzum – Armenia (Erivan, Echmiadzin) – Tbilisi – Sukhumi – New Athos... *
End of December. The four travelers take the road back: Moscow, Leningrad. Istrati is found himself implicated in the notorious “Rusakov Affair” (Victor Serge and his father in law Rusakov are being persecuted as trotskyists, Istrati takes their side, the Stalinist bureaucracy proves merciless). K. distances himself from this affair, Istrati is outraged. The two friends part “without shaking hands”. **
The Athenian publishing house “Stochastis”32 publishes the tragedy Odysseus (dedicated to Lenotschka Dybouk = Eleni Samiou), the tragedy Christos and the travel book: What I saw in Russia.33
* A description of the journey and dates of events can be found in my book: The Poet and the Poem of the Odyssey.34 In that book, the researcher will find the chronicling (not only the timeline) of the life of K. during the years 1926-38.
** Eleni Samiou devoted a book to her great journey and the discord of the two companions: Eleni Samios, La verdadera tragedia de Panaït Istrati,35 Publ. Ercilla, Santiago de Chile, 1938.
1929. K. continues his journey alone: Leningrad – Petrozavodsk – Kem – Murmansk (Jan. 20-24). Perm – Sverdlovsk – Omsk – Novosibirsk – Krasnoyarsk – Irkutsk (Febr. 9). Tsita – Habarovsk – Iman – Vladivostok (Febr. 18). He returns through Siberia and Old Russia. He arrives in Moscow on February 29.
March 25. He leaves for Turkistan: Tashkent, Samarkand, Bukhara. Return to Moscow.
April 19. He departs from Russia for Berlin.
April 20-May 9. 6, Keithstrasse, Berlin W. 62. On May 6 he gives a lecture about the Soviet Union. He negotiates with newspapers and publishers for the publication of his impressions of his grand tour. Kölnische Zeitung36 publishes some articles.
May 10. He settles with Eleni Samiou for a year in the home of Philipp Krauss in Gottesgab in Czechoslovakia (a house isolated in the forest). He writes the book Moscou a crié37 in French which was later renamed Toda-Raba38 (the Introduction and Afterword were published then by the magazine Protoporia39 Aug.-Sept. 1929, Jan. 1930). He writes simultaneously in French the novel Kapétan Élia, which was left unpublished. These are the first efforts of K. to become a European author.
October 1-March 3, 1930. The poet enriches, corrects, remolds his epopee,40 according to his initial schedule which plans for seven successive writings.
1930. From March onwards he authors the History of Russian Literature41 (which was published that same year in two volumes by the “Eleftheroudakis” Publ. House).
April 9-June 10. He is in Paris with Eleni (13, rue Plélo, XVe) working ceaselessly on the History of Russian Literature. During this time, there is discussion in Athens about trying him for atheism (for The Saviors of God)43 and the trial is set for June 10 (it never took place). Philéas Lebesgue publishes in Mercure de France42 a praising review about Christos: this one, too, (after Istrati’s article) is an introduction of K. to the French public.
June 10-October 10. He vacations, always with Eleni, in Nice (6, Avenue Cap-de-Nice, Villa «Les Pervenches»). He translates or adapts about twenty children’s books for the Athenian publishers K. Eleftheroudakis and D. Demetrakos.
November. He spends about a month in Heraklion. He returns to Athens (Dec. 3) and at once goes to Aegina to settle for the winter.
Kalomiris’s musical tragedy Protomastoras,44 an adaptation from K.’s tragedy which bears the same title, is presented again (after 1916) at the “Olympia” Theater by the National Conservatory’s melodramatic stage.
1931. He resides in the home of Giannis Aggelakis in Aegina and devotes himself to the writing of a French-Greek dictionary (Katharevousa and Demotic45), which publisher D. Demetrakos has ordered from K. and Prevelakis. He writes the first part, Α-Κ.
June. He comes to Paris to meet his working partner.46 He resides in a friend’s home in Meudon. He frequently visits the Colonial Exposition at Bois de Vincennes and studies the primeval world which he wants to resurrect in his Odyssey.
July 1-December 4. Settled again in his old home in Gottesgab, where Eleni (after a temporary sojourn in Salzburg) on the first days of September comes to find him, he works on the 3d writing of his epopee.47
The Parisian magazine Revue des Vivants48 publishes (with some curtailments) K.’s novel Toda-Raba. This same year it is also published by “Wereldbibliotheek” of Amsterdam, translated in Dutch.
The Athenian magazine Kyklos49 publishes (Dec. 1931) an African short story translated by Κ. Far-li-mas,50 from the collection of Leo Frobenius.
End of December. K. and his life companion receive Prevelakis in Gottesgab for a few days. The two friends plan out an extensive collaboration for the next five years.
1932. January-May. Κ., launching the scheduled projects, authors the scripts: Buddha, Don Quixote (according to Cervantes), Mouhametis, Decameron (according to Boccaccio), A solar eclipse.51 With this incessant toil, he hopes to forget his mother’s death (March). Lefteris Alexiou visits him in March for a fortnight.
K. transcribes his Odyssey, which is now complete (the later rewrites were intended for the improvement of certain parts). He brings the enormous manuscript with the 1984 pages to Paris, and offers it to Prevelakis as a gift.
June 1-end of September. Nikos and Eleni K. and Prevelakis go to Boulogne-sur-Seine to reside in two neighboring houses, so that the two friends can collaborate. (Κ. resides in 93, Avenue des Moulineaux.) Their efforts are met with little material success, but they produce some translations and adaptations in French and Greek (Calandria by Cardinal Bibbiena, and The Mandragore by Machiavelli). That summer, Κ. is occupied with the metrical translation of The Divine Comedy by Dante; he completes the 1st writing within 45 days.
October 3. He leaves for Madrid alone. A new spiritual experience awaits him there. He initially resides in Pension Abella (13, Calle San Bernardo), and later, in the home of his friend, the painter Timoteo Pérez Rubio (5, Plaza del Progreso). He is reunited with his old friend, the poet Juan Ramón Jiménez, and is acquainted with Benavente, Valle-Inclan and other intellectuals. He takes up to translate the best poems of Contemporary Spanish lyric poetry. He adapts his tragedy Nikeforos Fokas52 in the French language, which he completes on November 2. Simultaneously, he composes a canto in “terza rima” [triplet] as a tribute to Dante.
End of December. Struck hard by his father’s death, he seeks consolation in a long railway journey within Spain, a 2000 km route: Avila – Salamanca – Valiadolid – Burgos – Saragosa – Valencia – Alicante – Elche (Jan. 3, 1933): “nearly without eating, without sleeping, with exhausting nightmares”. (Letter to P.P. from Madrid, Jan. 5, 1933.)
1933. Upon his return from Madrid, (Jan. 4), he begins to write his impressions of Spain. Towards the end of March, on the eve of his departure, he plans a new canto, this, too, in triple rhyme, for his other “Captain”, El Greco. Passing through Paris, (17bis, rue Erlanger), from March 23 to April 5, he completes his canto and departs immediately for his homeland. As his life companion is in England, Κ. comes to meet Prevelakis in Aegina.
April 12. He arrives in the island. The two friends stay in Mary Pantou’s small house, in the Livadi area, at the edge of the sea. Κ. publishes his new pages about Spain in the newspaper Kathimerini (May 21 - June 3), and his Spanish Anthology in the magazine Kyklos (April - September 1933, pp. 409-428 in 1934).
From April 23 until July 24 he devotes himself to the 4th writing of his Odyssey.53 He then occupies himself with the correction of his translation of Dante.54
Beginning of September. He receives in Athens the couple Renaud de Jouvenel, friends of his from Paris. He visits Delphi, Mycenae, Olympia with them and he brings them to Aegina for a few days.
October. Prevelakis leaves Aegina. Κ., now all alone, burns with creative fever. He completes the Commentary in his Divine Comedy and begins to write a series of canta to honor the “leaders of souls”55 who give him courage through his struggle: “Tsingischanos”56 (Oct. 23-25), “Psycharis”57 (Nov. 17-20), “Agia Tereza”58 (end of Nov.-beginning of Dec.).
On December 26 Eleni arrives in Aegina.
1934. To procure his living, K. wrote two school textbooks (for the 2nd and 3d class of elementary school)59 for the Competition of the Ministry of Education (he wraps these up towards the end of February). He then corrects the chapter “Spain” from his old Journeying60 of 1927 and enriches it with new pages.
From the middle of March until the end of August, he composes new canta, dedicated to Lenin (May 19-21), to Don Quixote (May 21-23), “Eis heauton”61 (June 7), to Mouhameti62 (end of June), to Nietzsche (July 2-7), to Buddha, to Moses (July), to “Tertsina” (Aug. 7-10), to his life companion, Eleni, who is in Athens, ill (August).
August. Κ. writes another school textbook; a primer. He completes it by the 28th.
September. Κ. hosts his French friends Pierre and Mady Sauvageot in his home in Aegina. Prevelakis comes from Crete for a few days to see them.
November-December. Κ. is in Athens and then in Kifissia with Eleni.
The translation of Divine Comedy is published in Athens (at the “Kyklos” printing house.).
Toda-Raba is re-published in Paris by magazine Le Cahier Bleu, under the directorship of Renaud de Jouvenel. The author’s name is written as Nikolaï Kazan.
One of the children’s books (the primer for the 3d class of elementary school, on which Eleni had extensively collaborated with him) is approved by the Ministry. It is published by Ι. Ν. Sideris.
1935. This whole winter K. is absorbed in the 5th writing of his Odyssey.
On February 20 he boards a cargo ship which sails to Japan. Suez – Hong Kong – Kobe (Febr. 22-March 24). Kobe – Osaka – Nara – Kyoto – Tokyo (March 24-April 5). Tokyo (April 5-22). Tokyo – Kobe – Tianjin (China) (April 22-28). Beijing – Shanghai (April 29-May 6). Around June 15, K. is in Aegina alone. He buys a field near the house in which he has been living since 1933 and prepares to build his “cocoon”. Eleni, who had been in France for therapy, returns on August 15.
The Athenian newspaper Acropolis63 publishes K.’s impressions of the Far East. (June 9-Oct. 19).
1936. During the first months of this year he writes in French the novel Le Jardin des Rochers,64 commissioned by the publisher Grethlein of Leipsig, but which could not get published in Nazi Germany. He then authors (April-May) another novel, this also in French, under the title “Mon père” (“My Father” – which was absorbed into Kapetan Michalis: Freedom or Death in 1950.)65 On May 4 he lays the foundations for his house in Aegina (Vassilis Douras is the architect).
In the summer, he composes a new series of canta, dedicated to Shakespeare, to Leonardo, to Toda-Raba, to Hideyoshi66; he translates a play by Pirandello67 for the Royal Theater and this inspires him to write a comedy with a Pirandellian tone, Othello Returns.68 At the same time he translates the first Faust by Goethe: “I began the Α΄ Faust on July 23 and completed it on Aug. 5, 1936 – twelve days”. Quite possibly, he then translated Shakespeare’s Othello (the manuscript was not found).69
October-November. He is in tormented Spain, as correspondent of Kathimerini70 newspaper. Gibraltar (Oct. 12) – Portugal (Oct. 15-17) – Talavera, in Spain (Oct. 17) – Burgos (Oct. 25) – Toledo (Nov. 3) – Getafe (Nov. 5)... On Nov. 21 he has an interview with Unamuno in Salamanca and a few days later with Franco.
The newspaper Kathimerini publishes K.’s impressions of the Spanish civil war from Nov. 24, 1936 to Jan. 17, 1937: “What I saw, 40 days, in Spain”.71
1937.Winter-Spring72. In the tranquility of Aegina, K. is devoted to the 6th writing of his Odyssey.
Kathimerini newspaper publishes (March 8-July 5) the translation of Faust.
“Pyrsos”73 Publishing House publishes in Athens (April) Journeying – Spain74. The entire second part entitled: “Viva la Muerte!” is dedicated to the civil war. From March to July, Κ. composes the canta: “Megalexandros”,75 “Christos”76 and “Pappous – Pateras – Eggonos”77.
From September 4-19 he tours the Peloponnese: Patras, Olympia, Vassai, Mystras, Monemvasia, Sparta, Argos, Mycenae. Kathimerini publishes his impressions (Nov. 7-Dec. 21).
After his journey to Morias,78 he writes the tragedy Melissa79 in Aegina.
Toda-Raba is published in a Spanish translation in Santiago: Nicolas Kazan, Toda-Raba, Traducción de Hernan del Solar, Ediciones Ercilla, Santiago de Chile, 1937.
1938. This whole year (especially from May to December) he is occupied with the final writing of his Odyssey.
In January he submits Melissa to the Royal Theater.
This winter he suffers from allergies which are occasionally manifested on his face, perhaps a forewarning of the lymphatic disorder which was to torment him later.
End of October he comes to Athens to oversee the printing of his Odyssey. The book is published at the end of December; a voluminous book of great dimensions (0,38cm×0,265cm), dedicated to Miss Joe MacLeod, the edition’s sponsor.80
This same month the 1st edition of Journeying – Japan – China81 is published by “Pyrsos” Publishing House.
1939. The Athenian magazine Nea Estia82 publishes (January – April) the tragedy Melissa83 (which also circulated as reprint). It is dedicated to Alexis Minotis. Nikiforos Fokas84 is released in a 2nd edition by “Pyrsos”, in Athens. The Rock Garden85 is published in Amsterdam by “Wereldbibliotheek”.
On March 17, only one year after the publication of his Odyssey, Κ. notes: “I have decided to write Akritas86 with 33.333 seventeen-syllable verses”.
July-November. Invited by the British Council, K. travels to England. He stays in London for a while (4, Bedford Place, Russell Sq.), and then he tours the country.
Mid-August, he is in Liverpool as a guest of Petros Vlastos. Miss Joe MacLeod places her home in Stratford-upon-Avon at his disposal, the old residence of Shakespeare’s daughter, Susanna. Κ. remains there for two-three weeks and writes the tragedy Ioulianos87 (from Sept. 19 to Oct. 5) under the drone of war aircrafts. In December he is in Aegina once again.
In Athens, The Masterbuilder88 is published by Kalomiris. It is a musical tragedy in two parts and an intermedio, a musical adaptation of Nikos Kazantzakis’s tragedy with the same title, Gaitanos Publications, Athens, 1939. (In the main title it is inscribed 1940.)