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“It’s all over. The note to it, brief, simple, deep, as possible, indifference, full forgiveness.” This excerpt comes from a poem by Kostas Karyotakis that existed in the collection “Ideal suicides” published in 1927.
A year later, this great poet ended his life.
THE Karyotakis Coasts he was a sad man. Naturally, he was also a sad poet. The greatest sad poet Greece has ever produced, and undoubtedly the most important literary “voice” to emerge in the 1920s.
You can hardly find a small chink of joy and optimism in the poems he wrote. There is nothing sensual or heroic about Karyotakis’s poetry. She is anti-heroic. It deconstructs everything through self-sarcasm and deifies the ignorant.
Does all this sadness take away even a small part of your greatness? Obviously not. After all, it is not a coincidence that Ritsos Y Seferis stated that they had been influenced by his work.
Karyotakis tried to live. It worked. He fell deeply in love. The river. However, none of this gave him the motivation he needed to keep trying.
And so, after writing about pain, sadness, misery and loneliness, at the age of only 32 and while he still had so much to give to the arts and letters of this place, he left alone, to date of his death.
“Things keep us away, and poetry is the refuge we envy”
Costas Karyotakis saw the first light of day in Tripoli on October 30, 1896. He was the second son of the family, followed by another after him.
His father, George Karyotakis, was a legal engineer and, due to his work, the family was often forced to change houses and areas. They lived in Lefkada, Patras, Larissa, Kalamata, Argostoli, Athens and Chania.
Little Costas, from the first years of his life, was clear that he was different from all other young people his age.
Modest, measured, serious, sad and rarely smiling, he showed from an early age the tendency to letters.
He has been posting since his teens. poems in children’s magazines, while his name is also mentioned in a “Children’s Physique” magazine story contest. In 1917 he completed his law studies. He tried to pursue the legal profession, but was unsuccessful and got a job in the public sector. He started working in the prefecture of Thessaloniki.
He hated his job and the bureaucracy more than anything and developed a kind of unionism. That is why he was in constant conflict with his superiors and they punished him with transfers. Syros, Arta, Athena …
In all this, Karyotakis begins to publish collections of poetry. “The pain of people and things”, his first publication, was published in February 1919 and did not receive very positive reviews. His second collection, entitled “Nipenthi”, was published in 1921 and in December 1927 his last collection of poetry was published, entitled “Elegy and satires”. From “Nipenthi” onward, Karyotakis was a significant figure in domestic poetry.
“All my things, remember an hour we spent together”
Somewhere between hatred for his job and departure from poetry, Karyotakis falls in love. His first great love was Anna Skodryli, whom he met as a teenager in Chania. The second was the poet Maria Polydouri his colleague in the prefecture of Attica.
Karyotakis loved Polydouri deeply, but never managed to surpass Skodryli.
They met Polydouri in December 1921. He was fascinated by her attitude towards life. I was fascinated by his poetry. However, the bohemian life that Polydouri led was a heavy burden on Karyotakis. The freed girl even proposed to him but he refused.
At first he referred to his ugly appearance and how it would not sit well when he insisted, however, he told her that he suffered from a venereal disease. Polydouri did not believe him but did not step back and insisted that nothing more could be done between them.
Scholars of his work say that in his poem “Ochra Spirochaitis” (the name of the germ that causes syphilis), is the proof that the poet really suffered from this disease.
This love was unsatisfied. Polydouri, wounded and betrayed, went to Paris, where she continued to lead an unconventional life. Somehow, Karyotakis was left alone, continuing his lonely path to death.
“When people want to hurt you, they can do it in a thousand ways”
In February 1928, Karyotakis was transferred to Patras and a little later to Preveza. In its last season. His correspondence with his relatives during this period highlights Karyotakis’ desperation. On July 20, he went to Monolithi and plunged into the sea and for ten hours tried to commit suicide, trying in vain to drown.
The next day (July 21) he bought a revolver and visited a café in Preveza. After spending a few hours smoking alone, he went to Agios Spyridon’s beach, sat under a eucalyptus tree, pointed his gun, and shot himself.
In his pocket, the police found a note explaining his reasons. suicide from:
“It is time to leave her and move on. My biggest flaw was my unbridled curiosity, my sick imagination and my attempt to know all the emotions, without being able to feel most of them. But I hate the vulgar act attributed to me. I only asked for your Imaginary atmosphere, utmost bitterness. I’m not the right person for the job either. All my past convinces me of this. Every reality of mine was disgusting. I had the vertigo of danger. And I accept the danger that came with a willing heart. I pay for those who, like me, did not see any ideal in their lives, were always in the lurch of their vacillations or considered their existence a game without substance. I see them coming more and more with the centuries. I turn to them. the joys, I am ready for an honorable death. I am sorry for my unhappy parents, I am sorry for my brothers. But I am leaving with my forehead raised. I was ill. Please telegraph, to predispose my family, my uncle Demosthenes Karyotakis, Monis Prodromou Street, Aristotelous Lane, Athens.
[Υ.Γ.] And to change the tone. I advise those who can swim never to attempt suicide by sea. All night tonight, for ten hours, I was soaked in the waves. A little water in abundance, but every now and then, without realizing it, my mouth would rise to the surface. “Someday, when I have the opportunity, I will write the impressions of a drowned person.”
Contemporary scholars of Karyotakis’ life and work are now convinced that the great poet did not commit suicide due to depression.
They say that a specific passage in your last letter can reveal the truth. «But I hate the vulgar act attributed to me. I only asked for its imaginary atmosphere, the utmost bitterness. I’m also not the right person for the job. “ No one knows more details. Only assumptions can be made.
Karyotakis is said to have had an affair with a prostitute before being transferred to Preveza. It is not ruled out, then, that some people took the opportunity to punish the “annoying unionist” with a case of pimping and put an end to him permanently.
What really happened and what that “vulgar act” for which he was accused consisted will remain a mystery forever.
As regards Polydouri, in Paris have tuberculosis. One night they found her lying in the street. He returned to Athens to be treated in “Sotiria”. There he learned the bad news about Karyotakis’s suicide.
This news was worth even more. His health condition deteriorated and he collapsed psychologically. On April 29, 1930, he could no longer bear asking a friend for morphine and committed suicide by taking an overdose.
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