During his long career, Yannis Ritsos suffered exile, imprisonment, and the banning or burning of his works by successive Greek governments for his political activism. Twice nominated for the Nobel Prize, Ritsos drew the great tradition of Greek myth and history into the modern political struggle over the future of his homeland. And yet, John Simon has also described Ritsos as “a great bard of loneliness, but of loneliness ennobled and overcome.”
Poetry
Winter 1995
Bitter Knowledge
From the modern Greek. Stay in this sheltering half-light with folded hands. There’s nowhere for the lame night watchman to sit. The chairs were sold off two weeks ago. Out […]
Poetry
Winter 1995
Forgetfulness
From modern Greek. The house with the wooden stairs and the orange trees facing the blue mountain. Country smells gently waft through the room. The two mirrors reflect the singing […]
Poetry
Winter 1995
Perhaps
From the modern Greek. It’s quiet out tonight. At the window, motionless, the black swan with glittering eyes. The clock has stopped. Your fingers add up to ten. Now that’s […]
Two Poems
Winter 1983
Penelope’s Despair
Translated from Greek. It wasn’t that she didn’t recognize him in the dim light of the fire, it wasn’t his disguise, the beggar’s rags. No, there were clear indications: the […]
Two Poems
Winter 1983
Achilles after Death
From the Greek. He’s so tired of it all. What good is glory to him now? Enough. He’d known his enemies and his friends—his supposed friends—only too well; knew […]
Summer 2013
Perhaps
From The Kenyon Review, New Series, Winter, 1995, Vol. XVII, No. 1 Translated from modern Greek by Martin McKinsey It’s quiet out tonight. At the window, motionless, the black swan […]