 Henry
Miller
The Colossus of Maroussi
With an introduction by Will Self and an Afterword by Ian
S. MacNiven
ISBN: 978-0-8112-1857-3; Online ordering
Like
the ancient colossus that stood over the harbor of Rhodes, Henry
Miller’s The Colossus of Maroussi stands as a seminal classic
in travel literature. It has preceded the footsteps of prominent
travel writers such as Pico Iyer and Rolf Potts. The book Miller
would later cite as his favorite began with a young woman’s seductive
description of Greece. Miller headed out with his friend Lawrence
Durrell to explore the Grecian countryside: a flock of sheep nearly
tramples the two as they lie naked on a beach; the Greek poet Katsimbalis,
the “colossus” of Miller’s book, stirs every rooster within earshot
of the Acropolis with his own loud crowing; cold hardboiled eggs
are warmed in a village’s single stove, and they stay in hotels that
“have seen better days, but which have an aroma of the past.”
“One
of the five greatest travel books of all time.”
—Pico Iyer
“Miller
captures the spirit and warmth of the resilient Greek people in his
story of a wartime journey from Athens to Crete.”
—National Geographic
“Miller’s Colossus
of Maroussi, a paean to Greece drawn out of a nine-month visit
... the gestation time for a human and, in Miller’s case, for the
imaginative re-creation of a country, a culture and his own fierce
energies.”
—Richard Eder, The New York Times
Preview
based on a previous edition of this book.
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