The Poems of Athinoulis and Other Cats Author(s): Rigas Kappatos, Enrique Lihn ISBN: 1-59232-003-1 Format: Paperback, 64pp Publisher: Salonica Press Price: $9.95
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The Poems of Athinoulis and Other Cats, Rigas Kappatos, Enrique Lihn

Drawings by Enrique Lihn

These poems contain a luminous truth: The inner communion of life itself. They reveal the intimate paths where the life of things, of human beings and silences, consist in the astonishment of revelation, in the astonishment of brotherhood of life in species, in the winter with the rain, in the contemplation under the light, in the friendship of one animal. Athinoulis, the unforgettable cat that runs through these poems with his velvety paws, is the light of life of all things, with which the universe looks through his eyes at man, his companion. And it is the love for life what radiate his shining eyes and these poems, as a renewed testimony of the miracle of being, of the miracle of the world.

— Carlos Montemayor

RIGAS KAPPATOS (Cephalonia, Greece, 1934) is a poet, short story writer and translator.

He studied literature, music and foreign languages, but his work as a translator of Spanish and Greek books has earned him many recognitions. His work in this field consists of close to twenty books of poetry, short stories and essays, and includes the Complete Poetic Works of Federico García Lorca y César Vallejo, selections of Pablo Neruda, Nicanor Parra, Oscar Hahn, Pedro Lastra, anthologies of Latin American poetry and of Peruvian and Chilean short stories (the last ones in collaboration with the poets Javier Sologuren and Pedro Lastra, respectively.)

His translation: Dictionary of Symbols, by Juan Eduardo Cirlot was published in Athens in 1995 and in collaboration with the Mexican poet and novelist Carlos Montemayor he published in Mexico City, his book The poems of Athinoulis and the anthology Greek Poetry of the xxth century.

In collaboration with the Chilean poet Pedro Lastra he published in Chile a (bilingual, Spanish-Greek) and in New York (bilingual, Spanish-English) the anthology: The 100 Hundred Best Love Poems of the Spanish Language, and in Greece and Chile the anthology The Presence of Greece in Latin American Poetry.

He is the author of the book of Stories about Animals and of six other books of poetry. He also writes articles in Greek literary magazines and Newspapers.


ENRIQUE LIHN, Santiago, Chile, 1929-1988, is one of the distinguished poets of his country and of all Latin America. Besides his poetry he is also known for his drawings.
He studied Drawing and Painting in the School of Fine Arts of the University of Chile, and collaborated in specialized publications in that field. He studied Museology in Europe with a grant from UNESCO. From 1972 onward he was professor of Literature in the Department of Humanistic Studies of the University of Chile. Among his numerous books of poetry are: The Dark Room (1963), Occasional Poetry (1966), The music from the Lower Spheres (1969), The Station of the Helpless Ones (1972), From Manhattan (1979), In the Beautiful Appearance of this Star (1983), and an impressive final book: Diary of Death, published in 1989 after his death. In an extraordinary every day account, in this book Enrique Lihn registers in concise, dramatic poetry his experiences from the day he entered the hospital till one day before he died. Besides poetry he also wrote the novels: The Crystal Orchestra (1976) and The Art of the Written Word (1980). He also wrote essays on Literature and Art and the book of short Stories Rice water (1964).

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