Brief Chronology of Nikos Kazantzakis Life |
1883 | Nikos Kazantzakis born in Heraklion, Crete. |
1902 - 1906 | Kazantzakis studies Law in Athens. |
1907 - 1909 | Studies in Paris, where he is influenced by his tutor Henri Bergson |
1914 | Meets Angelos Sikelianos, with whom he travels to Mount Athos and elsewhere in Greece. |
1918 - 1919 | Travels to Switzerland and Russia as a senior civil servant, assisting in the repatriation of Greeks from the Caucasus. |
1922 | Lives in Vienna and Berlin. |
1924 | Returns to Greece and to Crete. |
1925 - 1929 | Makes three journeys to Russia. |
1932 - 1933 | Travels to Spain for several months. |
1935 | Travels to China and Japan. |
1936 | Reports on the Spanish Civil War as a foreign correspondent for the Kathimerini newspaper. |
1939 | Is invited by the British Council to England, where he spends the first few months of World War Two. |
1940 | Returns to Greece and lives on Aegina for the duration of the War and the German occupation. |
1946 | Leaves Greece for England, staying temporarily in Cambridge. In September 1946 Kazantzakis settles in Paris, where he works for a short time as a literary advisor to UNESCO . |
1948 | Settles in Antibes in the South of France. While continuing to write, he takes a keen interest in the numerous translations and publications of his works around the world. |
1957 | Travels to China, where he falls ill. Returns to Europe (Copenhagen) and is subsequently transferred to Freiburg University Hospital, where he dies on 26th October 1957. |
Chronology of Nikos Kazantzakis Major Works |
1927 |
Askitiki (or Salvatores Dei) A concise philosophical text, in which Kazantzakis expresses his metaphysical beliefs. |
1927 - 1941 | Travels Several volumes of the author's reflections on travels in Spain, Italy, Sinai, Japan, England, Russia, Jerusalem and Cyprus. |
1929 - 1938 |
Odyssey An ambitious work divided into twenty-four "Rhapsodies" comprising a total of 33 333 lines of iambic decapentasyllable verse. |
1938 - 1948 | A series of plays on themes from ancient and modern history:
Prometheus, Capodistrias, Kouros (or Theseus),
Nikiforos Fokas, Constantine Palaeologos, Christopher Columbus, Sodom and Gomorrah, Buddha, Melissa. |
1946 - 1957 | Kazantzakis turns to writing novels, in an effort to communicate with the wider public.
Zorba the Greek (1946)
Christ Recrucified (1948)
Freedom and Death (1950)
The Last Temptation (1951)
God's Pauper (1953)
Report to Greco (published posthumously in 1961)
|
Translations: 1954 |
The Divine Comedy (Dante). |