Kostis Palamas was a Greek

Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....

 poet who wrote the words to the Olympic Hymn. He was a central figure of the Greek literary

Greek literature

Greek literature refers to writings composed in areas of Greek influence, typically though not necessarily in one of the Greek dialects, throughout the whole period in which the Greek-speaking people have existed.-Ancient Greek literature :...

 generation of the 1880s and one of the cofounders of the so-called New Athenian School (or Palamian School, or Second Athenian School) along with Georgios Drosinis, Nikos Kampas, Ioanis Polemis.

Biography

Born in Patras

Patras

Patras , ) is Greece's third largest urban area and the regional capital of West Greece, located in northern Peloponnese, 215 kilometers west of Athens...

, he received his primary and secondary education in Mesolonghi. In 1880s, he worked as a journalist. He published his first collection of verses, the "Songs of My Fatherland", in 1886. He held an administrative post at the University of Athens between 1897 and 1926, and died during the German occupation of Greece during World War II. His funeral was a major event of the Greek resistance: the funerary poem composed and recited by fellow poet Angelos Sikelianos

Angelos Sikelianos

Angelos Sikelianos was a Greek lyric poet and playwright. He wrote on national history, religious symbolism, and universal harmony in poems such as The Light-Shadowed, Prologue to Life, Mother of God, and Delphic Utterance...

 roused the mourners and culminated in an angry demonstration of a 100,000 people against Nazi occupation.

Palamas wrote the lyrics to the Olympic Hymn, composed by Spyridon Samaras

Spyridon Samaras

Spyridon-Filiskos Samaras was a Greek composer particularly admired for his operas who was part of the generation of composers that heralded the works of Giacomo Puccini...

. It was first performed at the 1896 Summer Olympics

1896 Summer Olympics

The 1896 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the I Olympiad, was a multi-sport event celebrated in Athens, Greece, from April 6 to April 15, 1896. It was the first international Olympic Games held in the Modern era...

, the first modern Olympic Games. The Hymn was then shelved as each host city from then until the 1960 Winter Olympics

1960 Winter Olympics

The 1960 Winter Olympics, officially known as the VIII Olympic Winter Games, were a winter multi-sport event held between February 18 and 28, 1960 in Squaw Valley, California, United States. In 1955 at the 50th IOC meeting, the organizing committee made the surprise choice to award Squaw Valley as...

 commissioned an original piece for its edition of the Games, but the version by Samaras and Palamas was declared the official Olympic Anthem in 1958 and has been performed at each edition of the Games since the 1960 Winter Olympics

1960 Winter Olympics

The 1960 Winter Olympics, officially known as the VIII Olympic Winter Games, were a winter multi-sport event held between February 18 and 28, 1960 in Squaw Valley, California, United States. In 1955 at the 50th IOC meeting, the organizing committee made the surprise choice to award Squaw Valley as...

.

The old administration building of the University of Athens, in downtown Athens, where his work office was located, is now dedicated to him as the "Kosti Palamas Building" and houses the "Greek Theater Museum", as well as many temporary exhibitions.

Poetry

He has been informally called the "national" poet of Greece and was closely associated with the struggle to rid Modern Greece of the "purist" language and with political liberalism. He dominated literary life for 30 or more years and greatly influenced the entire political-intellectual climate of his time. Romain Rolland

Romain Rolland

Romain Rolland was a French dramatist, novelist, essayist, art historian and mystic who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1915.-Biography:...

 considered him the greatest poet of Europe and he was twice nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature but never received it. His most important poem, "The Twelve Lays of the Gypsy" (1907), is a poetical and philosophical journey. His "Gypsy" is a free-thinking, intellectual rebel, a Greek Gypsy in a post-classical, post-Byzantine

Byzantine Empire

The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...

 Greek world, an explorer of work, love, art, country, history, religion and science, keenly aware of his roots and of the contradictions between his classical and Christian heritages.

Collections of poems

• Songs of my Fatherland (1886)
• Hymn to Athena
  Athena
  In Greek mythology, Athena, Athenê, or Athene , also referred to as Pallas Athena/Athene , is the goddess of wisdom, courage, inspiration, civilization, warfare, strength, strategy, the arts, crafts, justice, and skill. Minerva, Athena's Roman incarnation, embodies similar attributes. Athena is...
  
   (1889)
• Eyes of my Soul (1892)
• Iambs
  Iambus (genre)
  Iambus was a genre of ancient Greek poetry that included but was not restricted to the iambic meter and whose origins modern scholars have traced to the cults of Demeter and Dionysus. The genre featured insulting and obscene language...
  
   and Anapaest
  Anapaest
  An anapaest is a metrical foot used in formal poetry. In classical quantitative meters it consists of two short syllables followed by a long one; in accentual stress meters it consists of two unstressed syllables followed by one stressed syllable. It may be seen as a reversed dactyl...
  
  s (1897)
• The Grave (1898)
• The Greetings of the Sun-born (1900)
• Life Immobile(1904)
• Twelve Lays of the Gypsy (1907)
• The King's flute (1910)
• Yearnings of the Lagoon (1912)
• Satirical Exercises (1912)
• The City and Solitude (1912)
• Altars (1915)
• Extempora (1919)
• The 14 verses (1919)
• The 5 verses - The passionate secret whispers - The Wolves - Two flowers from afar (1925)
• Cowardly and Harsh verses (1928)
• The 3 Verse Cycle (1929)
• Passages and Greetings (1931)
• The Nights of Phemius
  Phemius
  In Homer's epic poem, the Odyssey Phemius is an Ithacan poet who performs narrative songs in the house of the absent Odysseus. His audience is made up largely of the "Suitors" , who live in the house while attempting to persuade Penelope to marry one of them...
  
   (1935)
• Evening Fire (1944, posthumous edition by his son, Leander Palamas)

Critique-Essays

Palamas was one of the most respected literary critics of his day, and instrumental in the reappraisal of the works of Andreas Kalvos

Andreas Kalvos

Andreas Kalvos was a contemporary of Dionysios Solomos and one of the greatest Greek writers of the 19th century. Paradoxically enough, no known portrait of his survives today.-Biography:...

, Dionysios Solomos

Dionysios Solomos

Dionysios Solomos was a Greek poet from Zakynthos. He is best known for writing the Hymn to Liberty , of which the first two stanzas, set to music by Nikolaos Mantzaros, became the Greek national anthem in 1865...

 and the "Ionian School" of poetry, Kostas Krystallis

Kostas Krystallis

Kostas Krystallis was a Greek author and poet, representative of 19th century Greek pastoral literature. He was born an Ottoman subject in Epirus, but escaped to Greece after being denounced to the authorities for writing a patriotic collection of poetry...

 et al.

Translations

• The King's Flute, tr. T. P. Stephanides, G. C. Katsimbalis (1982) [Greek and English texts]
• The King's Flute, tr. F. Will (1967)
• The Twelve Lays of the Gypsy, tr. G. Thomson (1969)
• The Twelve Words of the Gypsy, tr. T. P. Stephanides, G. C. Katsimbalis (1974; repr. 1975)

External links