Guest of the ilb 2003
Jorgos Skambardonis was born in Thessaloniki in northern Greece in 1953. After studying French Literature, he worked as a freelance journalist for the press, radio, and television; he also wrote screenplays and worked for and published various literary magazines. He is currently chief editor of the culture magazine 'Panselinos' in Thessaloniki.
Skambardonis first made his debut as a writer in 1989. He primarily writes short prose which is what he became known for. Most of the stories with their dense atmospheres are situated in the author’s hometown, in Thessaloniki and its surroundings. With stories that feature strange, solitary heroes and that frequently cross into imaginary zones – into memories, dreams, and the supernatural – Skambardonis is considered a modern representative of a poetic realism in the tradition of Alexandros Papadiamantis. The sudden switch to the imaginary often not only leads to his protagonists’ pasts, but also to a half-forgotten folk tradition, whose traces have largely been washed away by modern urban life – a topic which permanently interests the author. In 1993 in his native country he received the state literature prize for prose. A selection of his stories was published in 1998 in German translation under the title 'Der Staatsanwalt im Nebel'.
Skambardonis’ novels are clearly influenced by his short prose writing: in 'Gernáo epityxós' the woman tells of the bitterness of an insignificant life that passed without leaving any real traces and does so as if she is sitting before a camera. Brief flashbacks form a fragmentary image of an existence and surprise the reader with lurid transgressions of reality that work like psychological escape movements. The author rewrote the book as a theater piece and it was performed with great success. In his second novel 'Ouzeri Tsitsanis' (2001), with an almost film-like technique, Skambardonis paints an oppressive portrait of Thessaloniki at the time of the German occupation and the persecution of the Jews. At the same time he takes a look at the life of the big Rembetiko artist Vassilis Tsitsanis and at Greece’s traditional subculture. The seemingly carefree creativity of the musician forms a counter world to a life that at this time was otherwise characterized by fear, hunger, persecution, and death. The novel’s plot is a reduced one; the dialogue- and character-filled text is a combination of heterogeneous sequences, which also contain documentary material and surreal moments and which thoroughly live from the mood.
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