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Vassilis Vassilikos, one of Greece's most acclaimed novelists, has published more than 90 books, including novels, short stories, essays, poetry and plays. His novel Z was first published 1967 and has since been translated into 32 languages. Karen Emmerich is the recipient of Fulbright and Onassis fellowships, and has translated work by Rhea Galanake and Margarita Karapanou to great acclaim. In 1999 she won the Elizabeth Constantinides Translation Prize from the Modern Greek Studies Association.
Clearly something of an evolving work in progress, this remarkable book originally appeared as three distinct volumes during the 1970s, and was first published in this form in 1996. And, thanks to the talents of Karen Emmerich, who has previously won awards for her translations of contemporary Greek authors, it loses nothing in the conversion to English. Vassilis Vassilikos, who has been the Greek ambassador to UNESCO since 1996, is certainly prolific, having written more than 90 books that have been translated into 30 different languages. This is regarded as one of his most important works, being taught in schools and universities throughout Greece as a contemporary classic. The life of a man who met his death as a meal for a tribe of New Guinea cannibals (who later became vegetarians) provides Vassilikos with the opportunity to take on the 20th century. And he covers it all, from the human need to form groups to the experience of writing in bread, to a passion for umbrellas and describing what would normally be considered as disgusting as 'a happy cloud' of insects. His great love for language and his mastery of words has the author consider the difficulty that language sometimes has in transcending its own limitations, reminding us that nothing compares to the first-hand experience itself. Considering his own experiences as much as those of his native land, Vassilikos offers what the translator describes as 'a kind of fictional biography of a nonfictional individual'. Childhood experiences against a backdrop of the Second World War are examined in detail, as is life as part of the Greek diaspora. The 'absurd' position of the 'emigrant, the expatriate, the exile, the refugee, the resident alien' lends the rich, layered prose all the more relevance to European life in the early part of the 21st century (Kirkus UK)
