The collecting of literary archives in Greece introduces a rich and diverse range of institutions, with major roles for archives, libraries, foundations and museums, including museums dedicated to a single author (Nikos Kazantzakis Museum, Georgios Drosinis Museum, etc.)

A major development in the recent history of Greek literary archives was the acquisition in 2012 of the archive of C. P. Cavafy, comprimising over 4600 manuscripts and personal items, by the Onassis Foundation – which also supports the famous Cavafy Summer School in Athens.

As in many other countries, notably in South America, France and the countries of the British isles, the national library plays an important part. The National Library of Greece holds literary archives from the past three centuries, including papers of Dionysios Solomos, Dionysios Romas, Demetrios Vikelas, Aggelos Sikelianos and Katina Pappa.

Also in Athens, the Gennadius Library, founded in 1926, holds the papers of a number of the most celebrated modern Greek authors, including Nobel Prize winner Odysseas Elytis, George Seferis, Georgios Theotokas and Elias Venezis. In an example of a “split collection” the Gennadius Library also holds some papers of Demetrios Vikelas.

The Academy of Athens should be mentioned, as it holds papers dating back to those of Ioannis Vilaras (1771-1823) and some papers of Dionysios Solomos and Georgios Tertsetis.

The General State Archives of Greece holds the papers of several important literary organisations as well as the literary papers of Georgios Vizyinos, Ioannis Dambergis and others.

Some universities hold literary papers, notably the archive of Georgios Giannaris in the University of Crete; and it is interesting to note that (as in France) there are a number of examples of local libraries building collections of papers of literary authors associated with their town or island – good examples being the archives of Nikiforos Vrettakos in Sparta, of Dinos Konomos in Zante, of Costas Krystallis in Zosimaia, and of Adamantios Korais in Chios.

For more information about this rich panoply of literary collecting, see: Marietta Minotos and Anna Koulikourdi: ‘Management of archival literary sources: the Greek approach’. Comma, 2017-1, pp. 121-130.

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