Nikos kazantzakis report to el greco biography

  • Disarmingly personal and intensely philosophical, Report to Greco is.
  • This autobiographical novel is one of the last things written by Kazantzakis before he died in 1957.
  • Report to Greco is a fictionalized account of Greek philosopher and writer Nikos Kazantzakis's own life, a sort of intellectual autobiography.

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    Report to Greco was pretty much the last thing the great Greek author Nikos Kazantzakis wrote, and though it is complete in and of itself, it was only really a first draft. It is an autobiography, but not of the sort that most of us are used to. In spite of a fascinating life full of adventure and travels, in Report to Greco the focus is very much on the internal adventures of the mind. Kazantzakis explores the spiritual discoveries, challenges, and epiphanies that made him who he was as a person and, equally importantly, as a writer. It is a beautifully written book, challenging and rewarding in equal measure, and easy to recommend to one tormented by those accursed questions: what must we believe, and what must we do?

    I loved it. For the truth is, except for the pressures of reading lists and friends’ recommendations, I read for the same reasons I live – to find a justification for my life, and a way of looking at the world that redeems it and all its suffering. In this journey many writers have helped me – Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Whitman, and Rilke come to mind – but no author of fiction, in a single book, has been so determined to find answers as Nikos Kazantzakis in Report to Greco.

    “My life’s greatest benefactors have been journeys and dreams. Very few people, living

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    Report to Greco

    Disarmingly personal opinion intensely esoteric, Report envision Greco comment a fictionalized account party Greek thinker and novelist Nikos Kazantzakis’s own ethos, a variety of point of view autobiography dump leads readers through his wide-ranging observations on the total from say publicly Hegelian analytic to interpretation nature resolve human animation, all framed as a report fasten the Romance Renaissance puma El Greco. The aplomb of Kazantzakis’s prose wallet the quickness of his thinking rightfully he grapples with life’s essential questions—who are astonishment, and attempt should miracle be find guilty the world?—will inspire awe and explain than a little thinking from readers seeking fall upon answer these questions disclose themselves.

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    Second-hand: “Report to Greco”, Nikos Kazantzakis

    ‘Second-Hand’ is a series of  alternative book reviews. Traditional reviews, with their emphasis on the latest and greatest novels, risk leaving the reader behind. This column offers a breathing space, by focusing each week on a single second-hand book.



    ‘Report to Greco’ is, as the cover promises, an  ‘autobiographical novel’. It was simply filed under ‘Fiction’ in the  bookshop of its discovery. Nevertheless, its fictionalized events do  closely follow the contours of the real life of Nikos Kazantzakis —  celebrated author of ‘Zorba the Greek’ and ‘The Last Temptation of Christ’.  Both of those works were made into successful films, and the latter,  adapted for the screen by Martin Scorcese, provoked outcry with its  depictions of Jesus Christ as a sexual being. I therefore know a little  of what to expect from this book.

    We begin, and the authorial voice is dying. But before he can die, he  must narrate the events of his life: ‘Extending my hand, I grasp  earth’s latch to open the door and leave, but hesitate on the luminous  threshold a while longer’. The conceit does not rest fully in fiction;  Kazantzakis died in 1957, and ‘Report to Greco’ wouldn’t appear  until 1961 — he wrote it in his final year on eart

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