Abstract
was December 1980 when I first met Patrick Leigh Fermor. Of course there had been sightings before that a man with matinee-idol looks walking the road into the village, erect in a military sweater, going to fetch his mail. Or on the road down from the hills as he passed the professors house I rented with Jonna, my first wife. We had been staying in the seaside village since August, two aimless young Americans sampling life abroad; and, as our Greek improved and this sunny coast came into focus, we discerned much talk about Michali, who lived in the villa to the south in the bay called Kalamitsi. Much was made of names. The Irish Patrick worked no magic in the Orthodox world, so in the war he had adopted his middle name, Michael, and to the Greeks he was henceforth Michali. To English friends he was Paddy. The former name was the legend, you might say, while the latter belonged to the man. As for the professor, in Greek his name, Fred, came out as something like Friend, and it was in Friend s concrete and brick pile, not yet sufficiently hidden by fruit trees and climbing vines, that I found Paddys Mani and Roumeli, and began to read. Then I bought A Time of Gifts at a shop in Kalamata and was trebly hooked. Eventually I borrowed Paddys other books from the author himself and read them all straight through. I distinctly remember that his prose made me hungry, and I had to get up for a plate of figs and cheese before returning to bed where, opening his book, I dove into pools of bright prose. So I had seen and read him. I desired nothing more than to be in the company of writers, as if their mojo might rub off on me as if I too could be a writer and live in such beautiful circles.
Published Version
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