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534 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1996
"Our whole history is a cycle of miracles. It cannot be understood with reason--and I don't say this out of nationalism. Who can explain how the Cyclopean walls of Mycenae were possible, the perfection of the Parthenon, which was built before you had a language, the sublimity of Agia Sofia, so beautiful that it alone converted the savage Russians, the women of Zalongo, who danced off cliffs to their deaths so the Turks could not capture them, or 1940, when we almost with our bare hands defeated Mussolini's soldiers with their beef and their overcoats and their imitation of civilization? Greece will never die, no matter how much people who hate our light would like to snuff us out."Did he really say this, and is her memory of all those interlocking clauses really that perfect? To insist on the veracity of what she writes is to miss the point, and to rob yourself of the pleasures this narrative can provide. I did learn quite a bit about modern Greece while reading it, and I have no cause to doubt the extensive and often-violent sexism that she reports on. Despite that, she clearly loves the place, warts and all, and this book filled me with joy in the same way that watching newlyweds or old couples holding hands can do.