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“I was born in Athens on April 30, 1903 (my passport says 1904, but it is wrong). I only received a high school degree, in 1919. I was 15 years old when I became an orphan from both my mother and father. The guardians,¹ even if they were university professors, held that “orphans” do not study. They become seamstresses or hatters. Even if they possess the necessary finances (and more!) to pursue high quality studies. For this tragic adventure of ours I wrote a short story, “The Orphans”,² which was published in Nea Estia³, translated by P. Prevelakis. (Our inheritance evaporated. They did not steal it, but mismanaged it, may I say, in the most foolish manner!)

In 1924 I met Nikos. In 1926, it was him who first suggested to me the idea of becoming a journalist. G. Vlahos consented to this and gave me a press pass so I was able to go to Palestine – Cyprus with Nikos and my two childhood friends, Kate and Marika Papaioannou. Articles which I wrote about this forty-day trip were published in Kathimerini,⁴ and for which, in fact, G. Vlahos, offered me high praises!

In 1926 I left for Paris (October), as a correspondent for Kathimerini. Our collaboration with this newspaper lasted about a year and a half. In the meantime, I cooperated with two other Athenian newspapers, the one [belonging to] Kotzias (Kostas) and I think, one [belonging to] Diakos. I think I wrote, or I am probably certain that I also wrote in some magazine under a penname… Unfortunately or fortunately, I did not keep any note of all this and I recall them only vaguely … in my correspondence with Nikos I saw that I spoke about Vlahos, Ventiris who was asking me to collaborate with him and wanted to pay me well, but I declined because at the time I was preparing for Russia, and besides, I could not take up three newspapers! In August 1928 I went to meet Nikos – Panait in Russia (Moscow). Ever since we lived with Nikos as husband and wife, but without a wedding wreath or a priest⁵ for eighteen whole years. We lived very happily all these years.

GottesgabI began to write Gandhi,⁶ which I finished up there in the beautiful mountain. From Russia, I sent articles which were published in two Parisian newspapers, Œuvre and Comedia! A couple of articles I wrote were also published in a magazine by Larousse at the time, but I can’t remember its name. These papers were lost during our various moves… it doesn’t matter…. Venice lost a needle!⁷

Much later, in Aegina, in 1935, if I am not mistaken, I wrote The True Tragedy of Panait Istrati,⁸ which was published in Santiago of Chile, at the Publishing House “Ersilia”, (where Gandhi was also published, translated from the French, by Editions Delachaux et Niestlé, Nechatel, Switzerland).

In 1967 I completed Nikos’s biography, Le Dissident.⁹ (It has been published in France, America, England, Germany and Spain). It is also going to be published in Athens and Brazil.

I have written, particularly in 1935, when I spent many months bedridden, plenty of poems and some which I think withstand the passage of time. During the final years in Antibes I went to Cannes, at the Film Festivals and dispatched articles from there to Nea Estia. I do not recall well how many translations I have done, but I have translated a lot of Chinese and Japanese, as well as African songs…

Toda Raba¹⁰and Report to Greco¹¹. I also completed our trip to Japan – China,¹² which was published, apart from the Greek and French, in English in both countries, America and England. (For this travel book, I imagine, the Chinese invited me 2 times. I only went once after Nikos’s death. The first time, I couldn’t go, because I was departing for... Japan!)

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What gave me some consolations during these last harsh years, were the lectures. About Greece, Kazantzakis, Freedom, Vietnam and China! (and Cyprus!! of course.)

The first lecture I gave, in France, about Gandhi, was truly successful and it enthused Nikos. Since then I spoke also in Athens about Israel, and in France, again about Israel, and then about Japan – China, and again about Greece, Vietnam and China. I spoke many times in different radio and television stations…

In the last five years, every spring, I have been invited in the U.S.A. where I spoke at various universities and simultaneously in public halls and gatherings of Greeks, like, for example, in Chicago, invited by the Association of Greek Scientists, the Ecumenical Institute etc.

I forgot to tell you that I first spoke about the tragedy of Greece in Canada, in Montreal, with Mr. Rousseas, and a little earlier (I had forgotten about this too) in Geneva, at Rencontres Internationales. Believe it if you like, the Portuguese delegates were weeping for our troubles.

I then opened the World Conference on women in Montreal, with a lecture on Freedom, the Nuclear Bomb and Vietnam. Also in Brussels, again in a grand Socialist Convention I spoke about Greece.

In America, I began with New York, in Columbia University. Then San Francisco, Berkeley, Los Angeles, Ball University in Muncie, in Indianapolis, Minneapolis, Bloomington, Chicago, etc., etc., etc... Springfield, Dartmouth, etc., etc., etc… I also spoke with Papandreou¹³ in New York.

Remember, I beseech you, to correct in your manuscript, that I did not go to Drake University many times, but only two. On May 8, 1974, for the lecture on Nikos and on the 18th for the Graduation Ceremony.

About the degree “Honoris causa” I was nominated by Mr. R. Osborn, whom I saw only once in my life, but who knew and heard what I had said in various universities and had also read my book on Nikos. Mr. Osborn, Professor of Theology, taught Nikos’s Odyssey for the entire year 1974, at the School of Religion where he teaches.

This is it, in general, so that you might understand what came over them and they gave me such an honorary degree! I collaborated with Prof. Panetso and Nikos in 2 school textbooks. The one, for the 3d grade,¹⁴ was approved.

The End and Glory to God,

ΑΜEΝ”

Translator’s note: The autobiographical note of Eleni N. Kazantzakis was published in the bi-monthly journal Helliniko Panorama [Ελληνικό Πανόραμα], Issue 39, May-June 2004, ISSN: 1108-2585.

This translation from Greek to English was done with the utmost reverence to the unique tone of Eleni’s writing. Minor adjustments have been made to ensure optimal legibility, and a few typographical errors were smoothed out for clarity’s sake.

This note is a true testament of Eleni’s distinct manner of speaking. It echoes Eleni’s humor, tone and inflections, the way she downplayed her accomplishments, her delicate nuances, the playful way she leaped from one exciting topic to another and then completed her thought with a small joke or proverb. It was probably written after a special request for “a page or two about her life” for some publication or official use. Unaccustomed to talking about herself, she wrote it with the lighthearted way she might address a friend, the same way she would talk to us when telling one of “My Nikos’s stories”. I can imagine her sitting by her little mahogany desk, squirming in her chair, writing it as swiftly as she could type, and then refusing to proofread it, for the simple reason that it was not about Nikos, but about herself.

Niki P. Stavrou