Christos Chrissopoulos

In 2012, at the peak of the Greek financial crisis, Christos Chrissopoulos published Flashlight in the Mouth, a chronicle that could double as a biography of the city of Athens. Approaching the city through multiple perspectives, as a resident, chronicler, and wanderer, the writer offers an unflinching portrayal of the deprivation that was spreading though Athens at the time. This was his second major work after the iconoclastic The Parthenon Bomber: A Novella, an allegory about the unbearable pressure exerted on contemporary Greece by the glory of a long-gone past, published in English in 2017 by Other Press. In addition to novels and short stories, Chrissopoulos has also experimented with various literary forms and their narrative connections with other arts, such as photography and theater. He has published 20 books which have been translated in multiple languages. With his endless curiosity and eagerness to explore, he has taken on many different roles in the country’s cultural landscape: assistant artistic director for the Municipal Theater of Piraeus, teacher of Creative Writing and Narrative Therapy, co-founder and director of the cultural foundation “Kairos Politismou”. His many accolades include the Academy of Athens Award, the international Balkanika Prize, and the French awards Prix Ravachol and Prix Laure Bataillon. In 2015, the French Republic awarded him the title of Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters (Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres).