This is the story of Zorba, in all of his complexities, and about his friendship with the nameless male narrator, `the boss’. Zorba is the sun, fuelling the drama of the narrative, his light shining across the island of Crete.
The narrator - the man with the money - who owns a lignite mine in Crete, is looking for someone to operate the mine, make him some soup by a fire at night and hangout with him. In Piraeus, he meets such a man, Zorba. The book is about their friendship, and experiences along the way. In reality, the narrator is really looking for a male friend.
They set up base in Crete and start to mine lignite. Zorba, so full of energy and ideas, convinces the boss to invest in infrastructure to also log the nearby forest.
Zorba is a complex human. He is spontaneous, full of energy, visceral, of the flesh. Joy for him is to swim, run, dance, wrestle and fire a gun. He is a man of action. The type of guy who would chop off his finger because it interfered with his pottery work. He is a man of passion. When learning to play the Santouri he did not eat for three days.
He feels joy, love and sorrow deeply. When his 3-year-old son, Dimitraki died, he was compelled to dance to stop from going insane. He is a killer, albeit in the context of war. He does have the ability to change - he is now ashamed that he killed Turks. He has his flaws - some of his hundreds of ideas do not quite work out as planned, like the one about the logging of the forest. His heart is however in the right place; he possesses a generosity of spirit.
Many people in Greece are Zorba-esque. A few years ago I was visiting Greece and met up with my cousin Spiros. We had a late dinner and stayed up till 2am talking. He is a construction worker and was starting work at 5am. At the end of the night, he drove us to our accommodation. Spontaneously, he cranked up the stereo, exited the car and danced a Zeibekiko in the middle of a highway. He felt a burst of joy and had to express it.
Central to the book, is the friendship between Zorba and the narrator. The narrator is an almost opposite type of person to Zorba. He is a reserved, somewhat repressed and intellectual. He thinks he is reaching the highest stage of Buddhism – to be in solitude and to feel no joy, and no sorrow. It seems like he is using this to excuse an inability to express emotions and to take actions. This complementary friendship of difference does seem to really work, although it has its contradictions. Why does Zorba, after slaving all day in the mine, make dinner for the boss?
Zorba is teaching him how to live, feel and express himself. One way of doing this is Zorba teaching the boss how to dance. Zorba leaps, pivots like a meteor into the darkness. Dancing is an act of liberation, violent and savage.
The book is about the joy of simple things. Of lighting a fire, eating fish soup, and having an animated conversation with a mate. This was a time of pre-tourist Crete, of a simple rustic life. The book was set in the 1910s to 1920s, a time of the Greco-Turkish war, of forced migrations. Greeks living in Turkey moving back to Greece, and vice versa. This time is in the aftermath of the liberation of Crete from 400 years of Ottoman occupation. All occupations are based on force and violence. This historical context manifests in the book in many ways.
A part of the book, but not the main part, is the misogyny. This is epitomised by the shocking decapitation of the widow, for the crime of refusing a suitor who subsequently suicided. Zorba tries to stop the villagers from killing her but unfortunately fails.
Surprisingly, the book is deeply philosophical. The boss is writing a manuscript on Buddhism. There are descriptions of socialism. All this reflects Kazantzakis’ exploration of religions, philosophy and political thought.
The cultural impact of Zorba, stretches way beyond the book. There is the film starring Antony Quinn and Adam Bates made in 1964, which won three Academy Awards. Then there is the soundtrack by perhaps Greece’s most famous composer, Mikis Theoderakis. When I was a kid, my mum made be dance the Zorba dance in front of relatives. We had the song on vinyl. Then there is also the amazing version of the dance by the Yolngu dance troupe the Chooky Dancers.
As we get older death stalks us, we can see it coming, although we don’t want to think about it. We can feel joy in simple things, like touching a grevillea flower or feeling the warm sun on our cheeks. At one point Zorba says, ``the older I get the wilder I become. The longer I live, the more I rebel’’. This motto is hard to execute but something to act on in any way possible. It is a fine way to try and live our last years, or any of our years.
James Vassilopoulos (Preston Chapter)
