One of Greece’s most celebrated writers in the 20th century, Nikos Kazantzakis was once asked what influenced his life most, according to the the china.org.cn

 

«Dreams and travels,» he said.

 

Born in 1883, Kazantzakis became famous worldwide with the 1964 Michalis Cacoyiannis adaptation of Zorba and the 1988 release of Martin Scorcese‘s film «The Last Temptation of Christ,» based on Kazantzakis’ novel of the same name.

 

A visit to Heraklion, his birthplace at the southern Aegean Sea island of Crete, and the Nikos Kazantzakis Museum Foundation, 15 kilometers from the city, offers a chance to capture a comprehensive picture of this universal versatile figure who continues to inspire Greeks and foreigners alike.

 

At a two story building in his ancestral village Myrtia, «at a place where wine trails meet the words of Kazantzakis,» Stelios Matzapetakis, president of the Nikos Kazantzakis Museum Foundation, took Xinhua on a journey into Kazantzakis’ life and work, his philosophy and his special relationship with China.

 

«Kazantzakis was indeed a great man. Not only a man of literature, but a thinker, a figure in arts and letters with multifarious action. He was an author and a poet, he wrote several theatrical plays, even film scripts in the late 20s, at a time when cinema had not developed yet,» Matzapetakis said.

 

«He had a great personality who has left a mark. Several years after his death, he remains a man who inspires the youth in particular, and offers guidance valuable to all of us,» he added, standing among Kazantzakis’ first Greek editions of books, some of his personal belongings, correspondence, photographs and memorabilia from his travels across the globe.

 

Founded in 1983 the museum houses a collection of more than 50,000 objects, ranging from manuscripts, diaries and translations of his works in 50 languages to his desk and glasses, his letters to and from beloved family members and friends or other great thinkers of his time.

 

On display are also studies on his work, a press, radio and film archive and artworks. Documentary projections on his life and work are available in seven languages, including Chinese.

 

The museum’s aim is to highlight the «lasting relevance of the word expressed by the great Cretan» and universal impassioned intellectual, author, philosopher and traveller Nikos Kazantzakis.

 

«The museum is a place of pilgrimage for all of us who love Kazantzakis, for all of us who get inspired by him. He is a radiating beacon, offering guidance on questions we all have concerning our existence, religion or politics. That’s why the museum holds a major role,» Matzapetakis noted.

 

«We are moved when we see people flocking to the museum for all the reasons I mentioned; to pay pilgrimage and find elements which resurrect him. We want to keep Kazantzakis’ spirit alive,» he stressed.

 

Among the thousands of visitors are many Chinese, since several of his books have been translated to the language.

 

Li Chenggui, translator of Kazantzakis’ work, has donated to the museum his handwritten translation of «Zorba the Greek.»

 

An admirer of China, its people and civilization, Kazantzakis visited the country twice in 1935 and 1957, as a correspondent of a Greek daily first and then as a guest of the Chinese government.

 

«Travels in China and Japan» includes his impressions from the first journey. The book is regarded as an exquisite example of travel writing. Kazantzakis gave an astonishing description of China’s splendors and pinpointed the psychology of the people with no prejudice.

 

«He first visited China as a journalist. He spent time, he saw China not as a tourist, the concept did not exist at the time, but he comprehended China. He saw and infiltrated the soul of Chinese people. He had great respect for Chinese people. He returned to China in his last journey which was also his farewell to life, becauce upon his return in 1957 he died a month later, leaving behind his soul and his last memories from China,» Matzapetakis explained.

 

«He loved Chinese peoples very much. This was the reason why he donated the royalties from his works’ editions to Chinese people. He did not want to burden Chinese people with a single rice grain for the purchase of his books. He made this donation to Chinese peoples out of respect. And I see that Chinese people love him back,» Matzapetakis underlined, inviting all Chinese visitors to Greece to visit Kazantzakis’ museum as well.

 

Strolling along the museum’s corridors visitors take a look at the figures who influenced his thought and work; Christ, Buddha, Dante, Friedrich Nietzsche and Yiorgis Zorbas (renamed Alexis for the novel), the man who taught him to love life and not fear death.

 

His friendship with Zorbas and their failed lignite mining enterprise were the raw materials for his best known book.

 

His odyssey to ideas, religions, foreign lands was his attempt to find relief from his haunting metaphysical and existential concerns in knowledge and travel, through contact with a diverse set of people, ideologies and philosophies.

 

Kazantzakis tried to synthesize all these different world views in his work, constantly gathering material during his journeys from Paris, Nice and Berlin to Spain during the Civil War, Russia and the Middle East.

 

In several of his texts he noted that travel was a deep spiritual need for him and one of his greatest joys.

 

The reflection of his spiritual odyssey is his epic poem «Odyssey: A modern sequel», which he considered as his crowning literary achievement.

 

A continuation of Ulysses’s story from the point where Homer leaves off, the book is currently being translated to Chinese, Matzapetakis told Xinhua.

 

Kazantzakis’ spiritual autobiography «Report to Greco» sums up his philosophy as the «Cretan Glance.» He conceived it, while looking at a Minoan fresco depicting a leaping bull. It is a moral stance marked by the absence of hope and fear in the face of futility. It is a moral stance he held to the end.

 

Kazantzakis died in 1957 in Freiburg in Germany where he was hospitalized for an infection he caught after inoculation against smallpox and cholera. He was buried on one of the bastions of the Venetian fort surrounding Heraklion.

 

The epitaph inscribed on the tombstone reflects his world view.

 

«I hope for nothing, I fear nothing, I am free,» it reads. Endi