DIMITRIS ALLOS
VASSILIS AMANATIDIS
ORFEAS APERGIS
PHOEBE GIANNISI
KATERINA ILIOPOULOU
DOUKAS KAPANTAIS
PATRITSIA KOLAITI
DIMITRA KOTOULA
DIMITRIS LEONTZAKOS
GEORGE LILLIS
IANA BOUKOVA
STAMATIS POLENAKIS
YIANNIS STIGAS
MARIA TOPALI
GIORGOS HANTZIS

biography | poems | gr |

Phoebe Giannisi was born in Athens (1964). She studied Architecture, NTUA in Athens Greece and completed her Phd, (Thèse de Doctorat )  Langues, Histoire et Civilisations des Mondes Anciens  in the University of Lyon II- Lumière. She is a member of the Urban Void, a group of architects and artists who have organized and performed a series of activities within the urban landscape. She works as an assistant professor at the department of architecture in the University of Thessaly. She was co-editor and writer for the literary journal Black Museum (Mavro Mouseio). She has written the books of essays Classical Greek Architecture, (co-author Α.Tzonis), Flammarion, Paris, 2004,  Récits des voies. Chant et cheminement en Grèce archaïque, Grenoble: Editions Jérome Millon, 2006 and was co-editor for The Ark. Old Seeds for New Cultures, University of Thessaly, 2010.
 
Her poetry and prose have appeared in many literary journals and anthologies. She has had four books of poetry published: Sea urchins, (Athens, Black Museum, 1995), Ramazan (Athens, Black Museum, 1997), Loops, (Athens, Nefeli ed. , 2005), Homerica (Athens, Kedros ed. 2009). She has translated poetry by Gerhard Falkner, Barbara Koehler, Gregor Laschen, (Poiesi ), Jesper Svenbro (Poietiki), Valery Coulton, Joseph Mosconi, Andrew Maxwell, André Pieyre de Mandiargues and also ancient lyric poetry. She has written many essays on ancient Greek poetry, lyric poetry, and also on poetics and its relationship to urban and natural landscape. Lately, recitation done in situ as performance, and recording, have become part of her poetic activity.

The dense minimal poems of Giannisi explore with arresting directness the relationship between language and the elements of the natural world with a language which is always subtle and inornate, skillfully bare. The seemingly loose images- often resembling fragments of a dream- which are outlined with a craft like diligence, become the material of an expressionistic depiction of the world.

Haris Vlavianos (poet, editor of poetry journal Poiitiki), Ta Nea (newspaper), 25-04-08

“Phoebe Giannisi’s re-workings of Greek myths are somewhat different, more intimately engaged with the particulars of the myth, more patient with a detailed re-telling. …  Giannisi’s approach is not reverential and allows for (or forces) a complete re-thinking of the myths. Perhaps it would be more accurate to call Giannisi’s re-tellings “re-weavings” because they alter the fabric of the stories. The methodology is similar to Cavafy’s (or to Borges’ or Jean Rhys’ or Christa Wolf’s) but the result completely original, entirely Giannisi.” (Valerie Coulton & Edward Smallfield, poets, New American Writing, 2009)