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 A very special event for Kiki Dimoula took place in Sweden last week (1 June): in the packed hall of the National Library of Stockholm, the poetry anthology by the poet and academic, entitled I kroppens främmande land (In the Foreign Land of the Body), published by Ellerströms, was presented. The anthology comprises 90 poems in Swedish, translated by Jan Henrik Swahn and Rea Ann-Margaret Mellberg, and spans all of Kiki Dimoula’s poetry collections. Photograph: Spyros Vangelakis The presentation of the anthology was organised by the National Library of Stockholm, the Greek Embassy and Ellerströms Publishers. The popular Swedish actress Stina Ekblad read poems by Kiki Dimoula from the new edition, and Elsi Dimoula, the author’s daughter, read two of her poems in Greek. Pianist Johan Sandback provided musical accompaniment for the event.Among those present at the launch were the Greek Ambassador to Sweden, Dimitrios Touloupas, and the translator of Kiki Dimoula’s anthology of poems into English, Cecil Inglesis-Mariello. Photo: Spyros Vangelakis Photo: Spyros Vangelakis Photo: Spyros VangelakisIt is worth noting that Swedish Radio decided in the autumn to broadcast one poem by Kiki Dimoula each week for six weeks, read by Stina Ekblad, a fact that demonstrates the significant recognition of the poet’s work in the Scandinavian country, and fills us with optimism and pride.

The essay *With My Best Wishes: Thoughts on Kindness* is George Saunders’ speech at the Syracuse University graduation ceremony in 2013. Three months after it was delivered, it was published by the New York Times, and subsequently shared and republished across the internet over a million times. It is the best gift for any graduate, a book capable of inspiring every young person, particularly at this significant personal moment when they need to believe in their own strengths and perhaps redefine their outlook on life. He states at the beginning of his speech: ‘For centuries now, a tradition has been developing for this kind of lecture: some old codger, whose best years are behind him, and who has made a whole host of terrible mistakes in the course of his life (that’s me), offers moving advice to a group of brilliant, energetic young people, bursting with life, and who have their best years ahead of them (that is you). I intend to honour this tradition.” George Saunders’ speech, author of the short story collection ‘December 10th’ (Ikaros Publications, 2015), a text that is both powerful and wise, describes kindness as a fundamental philosophy of life, as the ultimate goal for fulfilment in our lives, far removed from our natural tendency to act self-centrically.Above all, however, he reminds us that good literature and art in general can ‘awaken’ us with simple and true words. ‘For goodness, it seems, is a tough business — it begins with smiles and sweetness and expands to encompass... Yes, indeed, everything, the sky with its stars.’ Graduating from university is a significant milestone in people’s lives, as it is the moment when they are called upon to take stock of their strengths, goals and resources. After all, the knowledge students acquire during their studies does not guarantee their success but serves as a means to pursue the virtues of life, such as kindness and generosity.‘The sweetest people, as they grow older, become less selfish and more loving.’ Read an excerpt from the book here.  

Eftychia Giannaki, author of the new crime novel In the Back Seat, due to be published in June by Ikaros Publications, introduces herself to us with a text full of reflections on the writing of crime fiction. She describes her own relationship with writing and shares her view on the influence of the evolution of Western society on the flourishing of this particular literary genre.I think I was twenty when, following an accident, I realised that all my organs are perishable. Until then, I had no physical sense of myself. When I confessed how much this realisation had unsettled me to a nurse who struck up a conversation with me during my hospital stay, she reassured me that, generally speaking, there is nothing in me that is not mortal, and she gave me many examples of patients around me who were preparing to prove the mortality of the matter, whilst I was temporarily safe.Since then I have been writing because, among the few things I am capable of, writing always acts like that reassuring nurse who reminds me of the words of E.A. Poe, that fear, and particularly the fear of death, is an emotion that people like to feel when they are certain they are safe.As I write these lines, a lady is sitting next to me enjoying a cold chocolate. She even asked for a bar of chocolate, which she’s been nibbling at for some time now. Chocolate with chocolate, then. A short while ago, a group sat down amongst us, talking about a crime, about a car that had run over, killed and abandoned an acquaintance of theirs who was riding a motorbike. The group, despite the grim tale, ordered coffees, and the lady who heard it all didn’t feel her enjoyment of a large bite of cake diminished in the slightest once the account of the events had finished.What am I getting at? A detective story is precisely this kind of narrative within our everyday lives, a mirror reflecting what we avoid seeing just before we turn back to our pleasant habits. Many wonder whether such a narrative carries any particular weight. I agree with those who believe that this narrative has value, particularly as it has evolved in recent years, reflecting the social and psychological implications of the story in question.Antiquity lived with the hope of overcoming pain and death, with Epicurus going so far as to say that death does not exist for us. Christianity proceeded with its glorification of it, and the Western world in recent decades with its denial of it. In Europe during the second half of the twentieth century, euphoria and excessive optimism were cultivated through images that erased the public expression of pain and, even more so, of death. Were it not for the recent economic turmoil and terrorism, we would undoubtedly be talking mainly about the weather.It is no coincidence, then, that crime fiction—and more recently crime series and films—has flourished, particularly in countries where euphoria has long prevailed. It stems from the need to cast our eyes upon what is concealed.The past, the shared secret, the cover-up, the violence that goes round in circles, the superficiality, the simplicity of everyday things, even humour in the face of the abhorrent, the huge bite of a chocolate bar after a painful narrative, the city’s inhabitants, their conversations, and Athens as a microcosm of the artificial euphoria of a few years and a subsequent resounding fall—these are the themes that preoccupy me in my first crime novel.Now, as I write these lines, I realise that when the accident I began with happened, I was sitting in the back seat. Perhaps if it hadn’t happened, this story wouldn’t exist. Since then, I’ve enjoyed creating situations of fear so that I don’t feel afraid; that is the pleasure of the crime novel. And that pleasure is the same whether you’re writing it or reading it.Brief biography: Eftychia Giannaki was born and raised in Athens. She studied computer science, music technology and communication, and worked for several years in secondary education. In the past, another of her novels, entitled Hardcore, was published under a pseudonym and adapted for the cinema. You can find out more about her at www.giannaki.com 

So many books and studies have been written about the legend of world literature, Gabriel García Márquez, that his life has been transformed into multiple lives on paper.His name is associated with the most classic novels, *One Hundred Years of Solitude* and *Love in the Time of Cholera*, as well as with Magic Realism, defined as a literary genre that he himself established.GAMBO: Gabriel García Márquez, Memories of a Magical Life is the first graphic novel about the life of the popular Colombian author and has just been published in a translation by Kliti Sotiadou, who has also translated most of Márquez’s work into Greek. His devoted readers will be able to discover aspects of his life that until now were not particularly well known to the general public, such as the difficulties he faced before establishing himself, as well as how he handled his inspiration.Gabo — as his friends and admirers called him — was born in Aracataca, a village 160 km east of Cartagena, Colombia, on 6 March 1927. From his childhood in this village, he drew inspiration for his entire literary oeuvre. Macondo, the famous fictional village where the plot of his novel One Hundred Years of Solitude unfolds, is a reference to Aracataca.In his book *Los Nuestros* (Our People), Luis Harss, in presenting the birth of the movement that became known as the ‘Latin American Boom’, describes Gabriel García Márquez as ‘a man who can be shipwrecked without drowning’.This book aims to bring the reader closer to the life and work of García Márquez in the form of a graphic novel, tracing the epic journey that transformed the young man from Aracataca into a literary legend.Four key contributors collaborated on the book: Óscar Pantoja (scriptwriter and author), Miguel Bustos (illustrator and comic artist), Felipe Camargo Rojas (a graduate in fine arts from the Javeriana University in Bogotá) and Tatiana Córdoba (a visual artist from Bogotá). Start reading an excerpt from the book here.