The Poetics of Tasos Leivaditis:From Extroversion To

CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk Provided by University of Birmingham Research Archive, E-theses Repository 1 THE POETICS OF TASOS LEIVADITIS: FROM EXTROVERSION TO INTROVERSION. by VAGIA KALFA A thesis submitted to The University of Birmingham For the degree of MASTER OF PHILOSOPHY Center of Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies School of History and Cultures The University of Birmingham 2015 University of Birmingham Research Archive e-theses repository This unpublished thesis/dissertation is copyright of the author and/or third parties. The intellectual property rights of the author or third parties in respect of this work are as defined by The Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 or as modified by any successor legislation. Any use made of information contained in this thesis/dissertation must be in accordance with that legislation and must be properly acknowledged. Further distribution or reproduction in any format is prohibited without the permission of the copyright holder. 2 ABSTRACT This study sets out to examine the poetics of Tasos Leivaditis and its transformations in the course of distinct periods of his work focusing on its continuities and discontinuities. In the first chapter, I analyse “the first period poetry” (1952-1956) of Leivaditis and the transition from his writing about his experience of the concentration camps of the first two collections, via the politically and socially committed third collection, to the humanism evident in the last collection of poems written in this period (in a sense that Leivaditis' last collection of this period is less autobiographical than his earlier poems, it often includes fictional elements which give to the poems symbolic connotations and it is not exclusively focused on the historical events of the poet’s country but it refers to the social and political reality outside of Greece as well). Leivaditis' work of “the second period” (1957-1966) is explored in the second and the third chapter of this thesis. In the second chapter, I examine the poetry of this period which I regard as an extension of the humanism of the latter poems of Leivaditis' “first period” poetry. Issues of existentialism are also raised in this chapter concerning the poems written at the end of Leivaditis' “second period” poetry. In the third chapter, I address the issue of Το Εκκρεμές [The Pendulum] (1966), the only collection of short stories that Leivaditis has published and the transitional role it plays between the work belonging to second and third periods. In the fourth chapter, I examine the final phase of Leivaditis' poetry (1972- 1988), including the collection Τα Χειρόγραφα του Φθινοπώρου [Autumn Manuscripts] (which was published in 1990, after the poet's death), and the transition from realism to symbolism that takes place in it (via Leivaditis’ literary production of the second period). 3 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Prof. Dimitris Tziovas for giving me the opportunity to continue my studies at The University of Birmingham. His academic guidance has been an inspiration to me. He made the struggling process of writing up this thesis a great challenge and encouraged me all the way through. Special acknowledgements are due to Paschalis Nikolaou, who took an exceptional interest in my work and helped me with his suggestions to clarify many questions raised on the subject of this thesis. His comments on certain aspects of my work were valuable for me. I would also like to thank Elisavet Arseniou for her encouragement and her so much believing in me as well as Tasos Leivaditis’ friends, the poets Yorgos Douatzis and Manolis Pratikakis for our discussions. Last but not least, I would like to thank my supporting friends and family, without whom I could not have completed this thesis. 4 TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction p. 6 1. The period of extroversion (1952-1956): From the concentration camps to the anti-war poetry. p. 14 1.1. A political dimension: from the realism of “the poetry of the battlefield” to the symbolism of Leivaditis’ ant- war narrative p. 17 1.2. The social dimension in Leivaditis’ poetry of the first period p. 25 1.3. Poems about poetry: socially committed and communicative p. 31 2. The failure of the communist revolution and its impact on Leivaditis’ poetry of the second period (1957-1966) p. 42 2.1. The end of camaraderie: from the ideal to the realistic “other” p. 45 2.2. From social mission to the search for a personal identity p. 60 2.3. Determinism and free will in Leivaditis' second period p. 66 3. Το Εκκρεμές: a transitional collection of short stories p. 71 3.1. Το Εκκρεμές as a single narrative p. 72 3.2. The subjective perception of space and time in Το Εκκρεμές 3.2.1. Space: the topography of consciousness p. 76 3.2.2. Time: turning to the past p. 87 3.3. The hero and the others: from existentialist crisis to personal freedom p. 93 4. Leivaditis' poetry of the third period (1972-1990): From realism to symbolism 5 and from (auto) biography to fiction p. 105 4.1. The construction of a new identity: the fictional (autobiography) of Tasos Leivaditis p. 108 4.2. Fusions of time and space p. 120 4.3. Leivaditis' self-referential poems of the third period p. 128 Conclusion p. 139 Bibliography p. 143 6 INTRODUCTION The aim of the thesis is to show the development of Tasos Leivaditis' poetics. The new element that this thesis introduces to the existing studies is the research on the evolution of Leivaditis’ work (Το Εκκρεμές included) by focusing on the transitions during the various periods. I suggest that reconstructing the continuities in Leivaditis’ work is of vital importance, since it allows prospective researchers to gain an overall perspective. Such a perspective is hindered by the volume of Leivaditis’ work in itself and the researchers’ focus on his poetry of the third period. Studies of Leivaditis’ third period poetry far outweigh that of the previous two. The literary production of this period has been regarded as Leivaditis’ mature poetry and at the same time it is taken to be his main contribution to Greek poetry of the first post-war generation. Arguably, it has been studied as if it had been created ab ovo. The work of Leivaditis’ previous two periods, on the other hand, has been, at best, interpreted and acknowledged retrospectively under the lens of the work produced in the third period. It has been treated, in particularly, as statement of intention of his poetry to come.1 The emphasis, placed by the scholars, on Leivaditis’ poetry of the third period could be attributed to its intricacy, in contrast to his literary production of the previous periods, which is far less complex in terms of language and style. As it is shown in 1 See, for instance Athanasios Zisis’ (2003) doctoral thesis to which reference is made below in the introduction of this thesis. Zisis sees the first period of Leivaditis’ poetry as a starting point (“Οι Θεμελιακές Προδιαγραφές της Εκκίνησης") and his period of the second period as a transition (“Μεταβατικός Σταθμός και Απαρχή μιας Νέας Αυτοσυνειδησίας”) to his work of the third period. 7 this thesis, in Leivaditis’ work of the first and the second period, the language is literal and the meaning is lucid: the poems (mainly of the first period) refer to the historical circumstances of Leivaditis’ time. Therefore, Leivaditis’ literary production of the previous periods is easily perceivable by his readers, especially when it is placed in the wider context of the first post-war literature. On the other hand, the poetry of the last period is a web of symbolisms, both explicit and implicit phrases, fictional and realistic components that leave much space to research. Another possible reason why critics have laid less emphasis on Leivaditis’ earlier, politically committed, work may be related to the fact that Yannis Ritsos’ poetry appears to have cast a shadow over the poets of the first post-war generation for years; the former seems to have been acknowledged as the epitome of the political poet of his time. As a result, the work of other politically committed poets of the first post-war generation appear to have been studied in comparison to Ritsos’ poetry.2 Therefore, it can be presumed that the scholars who set out to “discover” Leivaditis, might wish to show the peculiarity of his case, thus they tend to focus on the poems that differentiate him from Ritsos’ and other poets’ of the first post-war generation. Therefore, Leivaditis’ poetry of the third period is suitable for further research. As far as the chronology issue is concerned, in this thesis I adopt Leivaditis’ division of his work into three periods, those stated in Kedros’ collected poems: a) 3 1952- 1956, b) 1957- 1966, c) 1972- 1988. As mentioned in the abstract of the thesis, 2 Indeed, the bibliography on Ritsos’ work by far outweighs that concerning his contemporary poets. On an indicative bibliography related to Ritsos’ literary production see: http://www.philology.gr/subjects/nef_ritsos.html. 3 The reason why Leivaditis proposed the specific three-part periodization of his oeuvre is worth- asking. The criterion that seems to underlay this periodization is rather historic: it reflects the communist revolution and its outcome: a) 1952-1956: the concentration camp poetry and the peak of the communist revolution, b) 1957-1966: the failure of the communist revolution and the period of disillusionment, c) 1972-1988: the transformation of the communist vision or poetry as a means of personal resistance. 8 in the third period Τα Χειρόγραφα του Φθινοπώρου (1990) is included, Leivaditis’ last poetic collection, published after his death in 1988.

Load more