Elias Petropoulos ( el, Ηλίας Πετρόπουλος;
Athens
Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates ...
June 26, 1928 -
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...
September 3, 2003)
was a Greek author, folklorist and urban historian.
A self-described "urban anthropologist," he wrote on aspects of Greek life that were rarely considered objects of serious study, including the subcultures, slangs, and music of homosexuals, drug users, and criminals.
Some of his books were regarded as immoral during the rule of the
Greek military junta of 1967–74
The Greek junta or Regime of the Colonels, . Also known within Greece as just the Junta ( el, η Χούντα, i Choúnta, links=no, ), the Dictatorship ( el, η Δικτατορία, i Diktatoría, links=no, ) or the Seven Years ( el, η Ε ...
, resulting in fines and jail terms and ultimately in his decision to leave Greece to live permanently in France.
Biography
Petropoulos was born in
Athens
Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates ...
on 26 June 1928, but spent his early years in
Thessaloniki
Thessaloniki (; el, Θεσσαλονίκη, , also known as Thessalonica (), Saloniki, or Salonica (), is the second-largest city in Greece, with over one million inhabitants in its Thessaloniki metropolitan area, metropolitan area, and the capi ...
, where his father, a junior civil servant, was transferred when Elias was six. They lived in an Ottoman house that his father transformed by eliminating the more typical Turkish elements. According to anthropologist Christos Panagiotopoulos, the young Petropoulos did not appreciate the restyling of the house, an incident that will return in his late work as an example of how, by rejecting the Ottoman heritage and claiming for their country a “European” one, the Greeks ended up sacrificing what had become distinctive characters of their culture and even of their food.
As he later remembered, Thessaloniki was the center of Greek left-wing thought, and as a young man Petropoulos acquired there the leftist political ideas he will keep throughout his life.
During
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, Petropoulos was active in the
Greek resistance movement against
Nazi occupation
German-occupied Europe refers to the sovereign countries of Europe which were wholly or partly occupied and civil-occupied (including puppet governments) by the military forces and the government of Nazi Germany at various times between 1939 ...
. His father was killed at the front.
In 1947, during the
Greek Civil War
The Greek Civil War ( el, ο Eμφύλιος όλεμος ''o Emfýlios'' 'Pólemos'' "the Civil War") took place from 1946 to 1949. It was mainly fought against the established Kingdom of Greece, which was supported by the United Kingdom ...
, he was briefly imprisoned for his participation in the
Democratic Army of Greece
The Democratic Army of Greece (DAG; el, Δημοκρατικός Στρατός Ελλάδας - ΔΣΕ, Dimokratikós Stratós Elládas - DSE) was the army founded by the Communist Party of Greece during the Greek Civil War (1946–1949). At ...
.
Although he did not finish high school, he was able to pass the examination and be admitted in the faculty of Law of the
Aristotelian University of Thessaloniki, which he left just before graduation.
He worked as a civil servant for the city of Thessaloniki, but in 1949 he was fired from his post after having been accused of being a Communist, after which he spent 8 years unemployed and marginalized.
He befriended since he was a teenager the songwriter
Vassilis Tsitsanis
Vassilis Tsitsanis ( el, Βασίλης Τσιτσάνης 18 January 1915 – 18 January 1984) was a Greece, Greek songwriter and bouzouki player. He became one of the leading Greek composers of his time and is widely regarded as one of the foun ...
, who led him to a lifelong interest for the popular Greek musical form
rebetiko
Rebetiko ( el, ρεμπέτικο, ), plural rebetika ( ), occasionally transliterated as rembetiko or rebetico, is a term used today to designate originally disparate kinds of urban Greek music which have come to be grouped together since the s ...
, of which he became the leading historian.
In 1959, he published his first major treatise, concerning three significant figures of contemporary Greek culture, eponymously titled ''
Elytis Moralis
Yiannis Moralis ( el, Γιάννης Μόραλης; also transliterated Yannis Moralis or Giannis Moralis; 23 April 1916 – 20 December 2009) was an important Greek visual artist and part of the so-called "Generation of the '30s".
Life
B ...
Tsarouchis
Yannis Tsarouchis ( el, Γιάννης Τσαρούχης; 13 January 1910 – 20 July 1989) was a Greek modernist painter and set designer who achieved international fame, and was "known in particular for his homoerotic subjects," including sol ...
''. In the following ten years, he embarked in a thorough and systematic exploration of Greek marginal
subcultures
A subculture is a group of people within a culture that differentiates itself from the parent culture to which it belongs, often maintaining some of its founding principles. Subcultures develop their own norms and values regarding cultural, poli ...
. He befriended homosexuals, prostitutes,
rebetiko
Rebetiko ( el, ρεμπέτικο, ), plural rebetika ( ), occasionally transliterated as rembetiko or rebetico, is a term used today to designate originally disparate kinds of urban Greek music which have come to be grouped together since the s ...
musicians,
hashish
Hashish ( ar, حشيش, ()), also known as hash, "dry herb, hay" is a drug made by compressing and processing parts of the cannabis plant, typically focusing on flowering buds (female flowers) containing the most trichomes. European Monitorin ...
smokers, petty thieves, and others who populated the margins of Greek society. He studied their culture, language and customs, and wrote about them. He also described the design of the ubiquitous balconies, courtyards, ironwork, and windows of Greek buildings, the methods and vocabulary of preparing coffee and the art of telling fortunes from coffee-grounds, the traditional layout and functioning of brothels, the role of bean soup as an unheralded Greek national dish, the specialized slang of the Greek homosexual scene — it is claimed that his book ''Kaliarda'' (''Καλιαρντά'') was the first dictionary of
gay slang
LGBT slang, LGBT speak, or gay slang is a set of English slang lexicon used predominantly among LGBT people. It has been used in various languages since the early 20th century as a means by which members of the LGBT community identify themselves ...
in any language — the Greek drug users' underworld and the criminal subculture.
The publishing of this controversial material that is often irreverent towards the establishment and defies attempts at censorship, earned Petropoulos three different jail sentences during the
dictatorship of the colonels.
Petropoulos was the only Greek during the 7-year dictatorship who had an identity card stating that he was an
atheist
Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...
(religious beliefs were obligatorily mentioned on Greek identity documents until recent years).
In 1974, the continuous persecution that outlasted the dictatorship forced him to self-exile in
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...
, where he continued writing and publishing
ethnographic
Ethnography (from Greek ''ethnos'' "folk, people, nation" and ''grapho'' "I write") is a branch of anthropology and the systematic study of individual cultures. Ethnography explores cultural phenomena from the point of view of the subject o ...
works.
In 1979, Petropoulos published ''The Manual of the Good Thief'' ("Το εγχειρίδιο του καλού κλέφτη"), a satirical but accurate description of the criminal underworld, the abusive practices of the police, and the state of the Greek prisons. The book was banned in Greece, causing international protests.
[
] Because of the book, Petropoulos was tried in absentia in Greece and sentenced to eighteen months in jail, which led him to decide to remain in Paris, where he realized his old dream of studying
Turkology
Turkology (or Turcology or Turkic studies) is a complex of humanities sciences studying languages, history, literature, folklore, culture, and ethnology of people speaking Turkic languages and Turkic peoples in chronological and comparative conte ...
and the Turkish language at the
École pratique des hautes études
The École pratique des hautes études (), abbreviated EPHE, is a Grand Établissement in Paris, France. It is highly selective, and counted among France's most prestigious research and higher education institutions. It is a constituent college o ...
.
He continued to write on Greek criminals and homosexuals, publishing in Paris books that will slowly be accepted and acknowledged in Greece.
On September 3, 2003, he died of cancer in Paris at the age of 75. According to his will, his body was cremated and his ashes were thrown in a sewer by his lifelong partner Mary Koukoulès.
This scene was captured on film in the 2004 documentary "Elias Petropoulos: A world underground" ("Ηλίας Πετρόπουλος: Ένας κόσμος υπόγειος"), directed by Kalliopi Legaki. The documentary contains the last interview given by Petropoulos and an overview of his life and work.
Published works
Petropoulos was the author of a large number of books, most of which have not been translated into English and many of which are out of print. He also published poetry, both original and in translation. The following select bibliography attempts to list all of his books in English or French, and the major works in Greek.
Books by Elias Petropoulos:
*''Καλιαρντά'' 2nd. ed, Athens, Kedros, 1971.
*''A macabre song: testimony of the goy Elias Petropoulos concerning anti-Jewish sentiments in Greece.'' With a postscriptum by
Pierre Vidal-Naquet
Pierre Emmanuel Vidal-Naquet (; 23 July 1930 – 29 July 2006) was a French historian who began teaching at the ''École des hautes études en sciences sociales'' (EHESS) in 1969.
Vidal-Naquet was a specialist in the study of Ancient Greece, but ...
, texts translated from the Greek and from the French by John Taylor. Paris:
.n. 1985 (Paris: Atelier Mérat)
*''Old Salonica.'' Athens, Kedros, 1980.
*''Rebetika: songs from the Old Greek Underworld'' translated by John Taylor, illustrated by Alekos Fassianos. London, Alcyon Art Editions, 1992.
*''Ρεμπέτικα τραγούδια''. 2nd ed., Athens, Kedros, 1983.
*''Songs of the Greek Underworld: The Rebetika Tradition.'' Trans. with introduction and add. text by Ed Emery. London, Saqui Books, 2000.
Books about Elias Petropoulos:
*''Harsh Out of Tenderness: The Greek Poet & Urban Folklorist Elias Petropoulos'', by John Taylor, Sydney: Cycladic Press, 2020.
*''Ηλίας Πετρόπουλος, ο τεχνιτής της διαστροφής'', by Yiannis Vasilakakos, Athens: Odos Panos, 2018.
Film about Elias Petropoulos
Petropoulos – An Underground World.''Director: Kalliopi Legaki; Producer: Maria Gentekou, 2005.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Petropoulos, Elias
1928 births
2003 deaths
Writers from Thessaloniki
Greek anarchists
Greek atheists
Greek musicologists
Greek male poets
Rebetiko
20th-century Greek poets
20th-century Greek male writers
20th-century musicologists
Greek People's Liberation Army personnel
Democratic Army of Greece personnel
Greek communists
Writers from Athens
Child soldiers in World War II