When I came across this book in the used book section I had to get it just for the reason that I moved across the same street - at number 75 - a year after the author did and lived there for 19 years. So it all was so familiar and just that sense made it a great read for me. I went to the same taverna, shopped at the same shops and tried to sleep through the same noise like the author did and also went to the same university halls and student cafes. For the general reader however I should say that it's main attraction is that it gets us right, as much as it is possible to put a "national character" in words. Good and bad is all there. A note on the editing though. Most of the Greek words are not correctly transliterated - the cheating sheet for example is a "skonaki" and not a "skournaki" and many other examples like that which of course are a bother to a Greek reader only. ( )

This is a superb book giving what appears to me to be a 'real' picture of Athens in the 1980s after the fall of the junta. His descriptions are excellent and vocabulary extending as I guess one would expect from a poet: rugose, temblor.

The poetry which began each chapter was also very accessible e.g. Gathering on p.208.

His coverage of the island of Aegina and of the ruined city of Messene were both inspiring. ( )