The Colossus of Maroussi

Author: Henry Miller

Greece

Published on 4 February 2016 by Penguin Books Ltd (Penguin Classics) in the United Kingdom as part of 'the Penguin Modern Classics' series.

Paperback | 208 pages
197 x 131 x 13mm | 160g

'Out of the sea, as if Homer himself had arranged it for me, the islands bobbed up, lonely, deserted, mysterious in the fading light'Enraptured by a young woman's account of the landscapes of Greece, Henry Miller set off to explore the Grecian countryside with his friend Lawrence Durrell in 1939. In The Colossus of Maroussi he describes drinking from sacred springs, nearly being trampled to death by sheep and encountering the flamboyant Greek poet Katsumbalis, who 'could galvanize the dead with his talk'. This lyrical classic of travel writing represented an epiphany in Miller's life, and is the book he would later cite as his favourite. 'One of the five greatest travel books of all time' Pico Iyer