Poetry
Akritan Songs
Ακριτικά
Angelos Sikelianos · 1942
Synopsis
Poems written in the early days of the Occupation, which take up the breath of the Akritic songs, those of the guardians of the Byzantine marches, to speak the grief of an enslaved people and give it back its courage. The lament turns into a call, and the poet speaks for all those whom the occupier reduces to silence.
Context
The collection first circulated clandestinely: a handwritten edition of one hundred numbered and signed copies, adorned with woodcuts by Spýros Vasileíou, came out in Athens in the last days of May 1942. Its form is borrowed from the medieval songs of the akrites, guardians of the marches of the Empire. In 1944, on the initiative of Seferis and Aléxandros Xýdis, a facsimile appeared in Egypt, under a Cairo imprint, with autograph prolegomena by Seferis. An English version, Akritan Songs, is credited to Paul Nord.
Who it is for
Short poems, in a lofty and archaizing language, of which there is no French version. A selection of the author's work appeared from La Différence in 1990.
Prizes and reception
Together with the poem he recited at Palamas's funeral in February 1943, this book made its author the bard of the resistance.