The daily Google Doodle for Nov. 2 is dedicated to Greek Nobel prize laureate poet, Odyseus Elytis, who was born on Nov.2 in 1911.
The Doodle depicts an olive tree, a ship and a bunch of grapes, all derived from Elytis saying: “if someone decomposes Greece, he will see an olive tree, a vineyard and a ship, meaning that if you put these together you can create Greece.”
Elytis, pen-name for Odysseus Alepoudelis, was born in Herakleion, Crete. The family, which originally came from Lesbos, moved in 1914 to Athens, where Elytis, after leaving school, began to read law.
Elytis was regarded as a major exponent of romantic modernism in Greece and the world. In 1979 the Nobel Prize in Literature was bestowed on him. He had a personal poetic idiom which made him one of the pioneers in Greek poetry. For many years past translations of Elytis’ poems have been printed in literary magazines and anthologies, but are also to be had in a number of separate volumes.
He was twice Programme Director of the Greek National Radio, Member of the Greek National Theatre’s Administrative Council, President of the Administrative Council of the Greek Radio and Television as well as Member of the Consultative Committee of the Greek National Tourist’s Organization on the Athens Festival.
In 1960 he was awarded the First State Poetry Prize, in 1965 the Order of the Phoenix and in 1975 he was awarded the Doctor Honoris Causa in the Faculty of Philosophy at Thessaloniki University and received the Honorary Citizenship of the Town of Mytilene.
Elytis’s main endeavor was to rid people’s conscience from unjustifiable remorse and to complement natural elements through ethical powers, to achieve the highest possible transparency in expression and finally, to succeed in approaching the mystery of light, the metaphysics of the sun of which he was a “worshiper” -idolater by his own definition.
A parallel manner concerning technique resulted in introducing the inner architecture, which is evident in a great many poems of his; mainly in the phenomenal landmark work It Is Truly Meet (Axion Esti) that became a memorable score from composer Mikis Theodorakis as an oratorio is a revered anthem. Its verse is sung by Greeks against injustice, resistance and for its sheer beauty and musicality of form. Elytis’ theoretical and philosophical ideas have been expressed in a series of essays under the title The Open Papers (Anihta Hartia).
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