Patras World Poetry Festival 2021

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4th “Patras World Poetry Festival 2021

13th - 19th of December

LIVE & ON LINE EVENTS

This year, the 4th “Patras World Poetry Festival” boasts a variety of original literary events taking place between the 13th and 19th of December 2021, hosting a total of 70 poets from 20 different countries.

The occasion of a calendar year combining on one hand the memory of the Greek people’s fight for freedom, and on the other hand the contemporary experience of confinement, led us to this year’s thematic center: “CONFINEMENT-FREEDOM-HUMAN REVOLUTIONS”. We bring novel aims and ideas, along with a greater and more essential need for expression, synergy and communication.

For 2021, the festival’s programme will be extended from 4 days to 7, hosting a multitude of events for audiences and participants both Greek and foreign, raising the bar and aiming to establish a tradition of cultural celebration.

This year too, for its most part, the Festival will be held online, a blended programme combining physical and online activities as adjusted to Covid-19 regulations, in a shifting terrain of cultural events during the pandemic.

The events of the week’s programme will take place in three (3) different places in Patras, each one of them a space for hosting cultural events. The events will be broadcasted ONLINE on the website www.culturebook.gr including both main and side events:

Main Events:

  • 15th-18th December 2021

Five (5) Online Poetry Meetings including Readings and Roundtables: There will be lecterns where the guest poets will be presented; their works will be read (in 2 languages). The guest poets will also participate in the roundtables and discuss topics revolving around poetry and criticism.

  • 18th December 2021

Online Award Ceremony for the Greek “Jean Moréas” Poetry Award for 2021: The annual ceremony for the “Jean Moréas” Awards for Greek poetic art and production in its entire spectrum.

  • 16th December 2021

Newcomer Poet Marathon: A night of presentations and readings of new poets, combining physical and online presence.

Parallel Events: (11th -19th of December 2021)

  • Festival Anthology: Limited trilingual book edition plus eBook.
  • Online shows:
  • #meet_the_poets: tributes and interviews online at the culturebook.gr channel.
  • #videopoetry: presentation of video-poetry online.
  • Poetry Set to Singing: music radio tributes to poetry set to singing.
  • Exhibitions:
  • Poetry exhibition: presenting the works of poetry
  • Book exhibition of Newcomer Poets: presenting poetry collection books from new poets; participation from established poets and publishing houses.
  • Art Exhibition: “CONFINEMENT-FREEDOM-HUMAN REVOLUTIONS”
  • Poetry Alley: Presentation of poets and poems (the ones participating in the festival) on a central pedestrian precinct of Patras.

During both the physical and the online events, there will be participation from internationally acclaimed academics, novelists, critics, and representatives of institutions.

The Patras World Poetry Festival 2021 is organized by the “Grafeion Poiiseos” Poetry Foundation, the literary website Culture Book (culturebook.gr), while it is annually held under the auspices of the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Tourism*. The festival’s events are supported by the Greek Library of London, the University of Western Macedonia, the Hellenic Open University and many other esteemed institutions, since the festival takes place under the aegis of the Hellenic Republic’s President.

The Patras World Poetry Festival is one of the largest literary institutions in Greece, certainly the largest of its whole region, and it has already drawn attention amongst esteemed festivals internationally. Every year, the city of Patras hosts important figures of world literature and offers a richness of events, including poetry readings, seminars and cultural activities. The festival’s vision is to promote Greek literary expression worldwide and turn this capital of Western Greece into a European center for literary studies. Through its actions, the festival communicates with various departments of Greek literary studies all over the world and it chronicles contemporary poetic expression.

A detailed programme will soon be posted on the festival’s website www.culturebook.gr.

Sincerely,

On behalf of the Scholarly Representatives

Kotopoulos H. Triantafyllos

Chair of the “Patras World Poetry Festival”

Skiathas D. Antonis

Chair of the “Grafeion Poiiseos” Poetry Fountation

---

EVENT MANAGER

Maria Alaniadi

Communication:

poetryfestival@culturebook.gr

grafeion.poihseos@culturebook.gr

Archival content available on www.culturebook.gr 

Nikos Katsalidas, Greece

Nikos Katsalidas, Greece

Nikos Katsalidas, Greece

The Poems

Maternal Temple


A priestess now, she walks to the altar of the fountain, bent,
exposed, deeply absorbed in the waters, she offers
invocations, libations, raises her head shyly to the ceiling of
the sky, covered by God's offshoots, with naked breast, to 
wash, to comb with unction in the healing waters, to
perfume her bosom. Her boobies were quince different in 
her youth, that sacrosanct enticing temple of the teat that
nurtured our world. What happened, where has it gone her
left breast? What happened, where has it gone her rosy, 
roseate teat, the spout where fits of milk gargled into my
inflamed lips? She takes out her blessed, her holy only
breast now and holds it hard in the lunar fist. The other has 
gone, she says, gruesome stabs cutting metastasis' storm 
and maybe bitches ate it down in mortuaries, in vaults. Or,
maybe, professors emeritus experiment with her bosom's
cells. Unibreasted now the mother stands in her handicap,
she washes her only breast and stuffs it back inside,
because it's well in there, he has forgotten it and Charon 
should not see it. Because, she says, he might have cut it
off as well, the black Charon, when he passed on his black
horse by her alley one day.


Translated by Klety Sotiriadou
The Heraldics of Thrush, Kastaniotis editions, 2008



*

Ο ΜΗΤΡΙΚΟΣ ΝΑΟΣ

Τώρα ιέρεια βαδίζει στο βωμό της βρύσης, κάνει δέηση,
σπονδές, χοές, σκυμμένη, ξεθηλυκωμένη, βαθιά προσηλωμένη
στα νερά, σηκώνει το κεφάλι της δειλά στην οροφή του
ουρανού, να σκεπαστεί από τα παρακλάδια του Θεού, με
ανοιγμένα στήθη, να πλυθεί, να χτενιστεί στα ιαματικά νερά με
άγιο μύρο, να μοσχοβολήσει ο κόρφος της. Αλλιώς ήταν στα 
νιάτα κυδωνάτα τα βυζιά, εκείνος ο πανάγιος δελεαστικός ναός
της ρώγας που γαλούχησε τον κόσμο μας. Τώρα πού 'ναι το
αριστερό βυζί, τι έγινε, πού πάει η ρώγα η τριανταφυλλένια; Κι ο
κρουνός στα γαργαρίσματα του γάλατος στα αναμμένα χείλη;
Τώρα βγάζει το ιερό μοναδικό βυζί και το βαστάει χαλεπά στη
χούφτα της σελήνης. Τ' άλλο πάει, λέει, τ' αρπάξανε μακάβριες 
μαχαιριές κόβοντας ρυάκια και καβούρια της μετάστασης, το 
φάγανε οι σκύλες στους θαλάμους των νεκρών, στους 
υποθάλαμους και στα υπόγεια του νοσοκομείου ναρκωμένο, σε
πειράματα επίκουρων καθηγητών στα κύτταρα του κόρφου της. 
Τώρα η μάνα η μονοβύζα τα βολεύει στην μειονεξία, βγάζοντας 
να πλύνει στα κρυφά το μόνο της βυζί, να κρύψει, να σκεπάσει,
να το χώνει μες στον κόρφο της, γιατί καλά είναι, λέει, εκεί
μέσα, της το ξέχασε και μη το δει ο Χάρος. Τι, σου λέει, έλεος, 
δόξα τω Θεώ, ίσως της το 'κοβε κι αυτό ο μαύρος Χάρος, πού 
πέρασε μια μέρα καβαλάρης με το μαύρο άτι και με το σπαθί 
στο χέρι από τη ρούγα της.

«Τα εραλδικά της κίχλης» εκδόσεις Καστανιώτη, 2008

The Poet

Nikos Katsalidas was born in Ano Lesinitsa of Theologos, Agioi Saranda. He lives in Athens. He read Literature in Tirana and is a poet, prose writer, essayist and translator. He is a member and honorary member of literary unions and organizations. He has worked as a professor of Literature and as a literary editor for the National Greek Minority Press after the Dictatorship. A fair sample of his poems is included in various world anthologies. He has translated thirty Greek poets and writers in Albanian and is one of the founders of the Organization of the National Greek Minority "Omonoia". He has served Minister for Human Rights in Albania during 2001-2002, and as Cultural Counselor of the Albanian Embassy in Athens during 2004-2008. He was awarded the highest distinction of Letters "Great Artist" by the President of Albania in 2012.He is a member of Greek Authors' Society

Το φανταστικό και το μαγικό στα διηγήματα της Καζο...
Μαρία Δαλαμήτρου - «Αποθησαυρισμένα»
 

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