Minotou and the Celebrations of 1927

The Zakynthian scholar and feminist Marietta Giannopoulou-Minotou, a pupil of De Viazis, engaged with Foscolo’s work from her early years. In 1921 she announced in her periodical Eva Nikitria the publication of her translation of the novel The Last Letters of Jacopo Ortis, which however ultimately remained unpublished, and in 1927 she issued her translation of The Graces. Thereafter she devoted the greater part of her literary output to Foscolo, since her Bibliography contains more than 50 publications, articles and studies relating to the poet.

Together with her husband, the lawyer and journalist Spyros Minotos, Minotou took a leading role, as a member of the Organising Committee, in arranging in Zakynthos the events for the centenary anniversary (1827–1927) of Foscolo’s death.

The events took place in November 1927 at the expense of the Greek government, during which the bust of the poet in Solomos Square was unveiled, a work by the sculptor Kostas Dimitriadis, in the presence of the undersecretaries of Education of Greece and Italy.

At Minotou’s expense (owing to a lack of credit from the Greek state) the “Festive Album of Zakynthos” was subsequently published, containing texts, articles and dedications by Greek and Italian men of letters of the time relating to the poet, translated poems by Foscolo, general articles on Zakynthos and the history of the centenary celebrations. The Album was a publication of the then newly founded Zakynthian periodical Ionian Anthology, edited by the couple Marietta and Spyros Minotos.

The Platyforos event in Florence

Worthy of mention are the events organised by the Zakynthian cultural society “PLATYFOROS” in Florence on 7 and 8 November 2007 to mark the 180th anniversary of the poet’s death. Specifically, on 7 November at the Auditorium Al Duomo in Florence, in collaboration with the Centro Romantico Scientifico Letterario G.P. Vieusseux, the Romualdo del Bianco Foundation and the Opera di Santa Croce, an event was held with speakers the historian Dimitris Arvanitakis on the theme “Before the nation-state: Ugo Foscolo between Greece and Italy” and Professor of Italian Literature at the University of Florence Arnaldo Bruni on the theme “The Greekness of Ugo Foscolo”. In the second part of the event the work of the Zakynthian composer Iakovos Konitopoulos “Libere Carte”, to a libretto by the poet, received its first performance, with mezzo-soprano Margarita Syngeniou, narrators Giorgos Fiorentino and Rosaria Lo Russo, and piano by Adriana Giakoumelou. The following day the president of “PLATYFOROS” with a group of members of the society, in a particularly moving atmosphere, laid a wreath on the poet’s tomb in the church of Santa Croce.