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To XOTIKO DESPINA CRIST $15.00
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- Despina Lala Crist's EXOTIC by Dora Tsimpouki, Professor of
English Studies, University of Athens. The work of Despina Lala-Crist is
truly inspired, for it is based on the quest for a spiritual, transcendent
center capable of healing the existential suffering brought on by the
fragmentation and de-spiritualization of the world. Despina Lala-Crist is a
tested author who has worked in a variety of literary forms. Among her
outstanding critical works is her study of the work of Giorgos Heimonas (Sto
Kaleidoskopio tou Giorgou Heimona, Kastaniotis, 1984). Her novel NOSTOS,
published in Greek by Kedros, 1992, is a dazzling panorama of life in the
Greek community of Asia Minor before and after the catastrophe. What feelings
and what events are enclosed within these dramatic scenes! This polyphonic
novel had the good fortune to be rendered in English by translator, and
husband of the novelist, Robert Crist (Seaburn, 2001), who engaged in the
text with love and care so as to convey this memorable but painful period of
Greek history into universal expression. Turning to EXOTIC (TO XOTIKO,
Periplous Editions, 2002), one can maintain that Despina Lala-Crist's most
recent novel belongs in theme and form to the world of NOSTOS, since it
treats the same scene and period. The heroine of the novel, who is
intentionally unnamed, is the orphaned, illegitimate offspring of a old
landowner and a young girl in Asia Minor. The three chapters of the novel
become the narrative of the heroine's process of maturation--that is, the
realization that "Life is a bright, brief ceremony," as described by the woman
who undertakes the heroine's care following the death of her natural mother.
And the woman continues, "Embellish it well and execute every detail that is
worthy." In this execution of existence, two worlds unfold--the realistic one
and the transcendent one--which constitute the heroine's reality. Her world
is, then, the harmonious blending of the real and the imaginary, the
co-existence of the immediate and the distant, the perception of spiritual
beings (exotics)as an inseparable part of everyday life. In EXOTIC the complex
preparation for adulthood is a process that is esoteric and directed always
toward the past, the way back. The word back has a double significance. On
the one hand the movement back is from immediate sensations to the discovery
of essence. On the other hand, the way back is toward the past, which is
reconstructed by imagination through memory. In this journey back in time and
beyond appearances, the heroine has a companion, guardian and guide--Theophilos.
Theophilos is the man who was overflowing with love toward her mother, even
though she refused him.
Theophilos also embodies the living proof of the actuality of nature spirits (exotics), which--according to the villagers--have touched Theophilos and robbed him of speech. Theophilos who, according to his fellows, is the victim of an evil fate that is jealous of the carefree happiness of ordinary people, becomes for the narrator (and the author) the most eloquent expression of human wholeness, the most convincing apologist for the divine presence in nature, the visionary of an invisible world which escapes most of us. Theophilos speaks rarely, only when he has something of substance to communicate, and his language is economical, pungent, lucid. These are some of his sayings. "Guard your soul against evil thoughts and bitter words." "The whole universe is a great miracle declaring the presence of God." "Things tiny and great were created for our delight." "On the dark side, a person is lost." "The person who feels deeply, thinks deeply. Look for the the answer within you." Writing a prose, as Nabakov put it, that works like poetry, Despina Lala-Crist's novel treats such themes with boldness and insight, lending a revived meaning to the legends and stories of our folk heritage.