Μνήμη Σταμάτη Καρατζά (review)

Abstract

282 Reviews Aglaia Kehaya-Lipourli and T. Petridis, editors, Μνήμη Σταμάτη Καϕατζά. Thessaloniki: EpistimonikÃ- EpetirÃ-da FilosofikÃ-s ScholÃ-s. 1990. Pp. 435. These voluminous proceedings of a conference organized by the energetic Department of Medieval and Modern Greek Studies at the University of Thessaloniki in honor of their late colleague Stamátis Karatzás, who is here remembered by his students for teaching them so very much "relating to scholarship, morality, and human dignity" (257), focus on problems that arise in the study of Modern Greek literature and linguistics, precisely the areas in which Karatzás himself concentrated. The volume begins with an appreciation of Karatzás's personality and career, stressing his contribution in unearthing more than 1300 letters exchanged by the pioneers of demoticism— Psiháris, Eftaliótis, Pállis, Dragoúmis, etc. Although his untimely illness and death prevented him from editing the letters himself, they have been splendidly published in two volumes by his colleagues at Yannina and Thessaloniki (see JMGS 6: 147-151 for a review of volume 2). The subjects covered in this collection are extremely diverse, ranging from metrics to translation to epistolography, to symbolism, to pedagogy, to the influence of foreign literature, to Pontic elements in medieval Greek, to linguistic theories, and to political influences on the reception of literary texts. In addition, there are several presentations of previously unpublished material , e.g., Drosinis's diaries for the crucial years 1941-1946, discussed by Yánnis Papakóstas, and a 32-page lexicon of rhyme-words compiled by Cavafy but abandoned—tellingly—in 1911. In his discussion of the latter, H. L. Karáoglou shows how Cavafy divided the rhymes into two groups: demotic and katharevousa, the latter betraying the poet's liking for homophonic rhymes, e.g., άμινα-άμυνα, όθισις-ώθησις, the former having the advantage of indicating Cavafy's sources and thus his reading, e.g., Valaoritis, Voutieridis, Zalokóstas, Markorás, Palamás, Polémis. On the other hand, the "katharevousa " group, because it contains words not then used in katharevousa, shows that Cavafy was drawing as well, directly, from ancient Greek and koine sources. In sum, the lexicon confirms much of what we already knew about the poet's linguistic practice. It is impossible in such a short review to give even brief summaries of all the papers. But a list of the remaining contributors and their subjects should be of use to prospective readers: George Savidis on Theotókis's translations of Shakespeare —their vicissitudes in achieving publication (containing previously unpublished correspondence ). DimÃ-tris Gounelás on myth in Greek drama. Efi Vafiádou on Pandelis Horn's Séntzas. VassÃ-lis Katsarós on irregular scansion in a poem by Konstandinos Manassis in a medieval manuscript. Niki PapatriantafÃ-llouTheodoridi on the theme of tradition in Byzantine epistolography. Roderick Beaton on the Prodromic poems. E. Th. Tsolákis on a new reading of the Timarion. Arnold F. Van Gemert on the Rhodian poet Manólis LimenÃ-tis. Anita FrantzÃ- on an 1819 manual of metrics. VÃ-ki HatziyeoryÃ-ou-Hasióti on Stefanos Xénos. Sonia Ilinskaya on Greek presence in Russian symbolism. Yiórgos Kehayióglou on the first known Greek translation of Don Quixote. Néta Apostol Ã-dou on Palamás's views of Psiháris's TaksÃ-di. Yerasimia Melissarátou on Reviews 283 Psiháris's Gulliver and the use of the term "paramithi." Niki Likoúrgou on Myrivflis's renderings of Papadiamándis in demotic. Aglaia Kehayiá-LipourlÃon the Xefloúdas-Tatákis correspondence concerning the periodical Makedonik és Iméres. N. D. Triandafillópoulos on Yánnis Skarimbas. Kóstas Steryi- ópoulos on symbolism in PlaskovÃ-tis. Nátia HaralambÃ-dou on the Left and the reception of Dimitris Hatzis. Ilias S. Spirópoulos on grammatical textbooks used in schools. Yánna Sivropoúlou-Kapláni on foreign literature in secondary -education textbooks supposedly of Modern Greek literature. Günther Steffen Henrich on Pontic elements in a ca. 1500 Greek-Persian-Arabic lexicon written in Arabic characters. Jean Irigoin on shorthand ligatures used in writing the Modern Greek dialects of southern Italy. Yórgos Alisandrátos on the linguistic views of Nikólaos Koneménos. Massimo...