Bitter-Sweet Island

Sad Cyprus. “Tragedy” is one of those words which have almost lost their value through too common usage, but Cyprus really is a tragedy in the true sense—an affair of good intentions gone awry, of disaster springing from conflicting virtues, of love and murder mixed. “Yes,” said one Cypriot, “even Dighenis, though he fights the British, really loves them. But he will have to go on killing them—with regret, even with affection.” This is the heart of the tragedy: that for a strange mixture of reasons, historical and legendary, the Greeks both on the mainland and in the island are passionately, romantically pro-British.

The poignancy of this situation is sadly and beautifully caught by Lawrence Durrell. He is a philhellene but not the woolly kind. He has learned to know the Levant by living there. He is a poet with a sense of humor, a Conservative but not a politician.

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Anthony Lejeune

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Sad Cyprus. “Tragedy” is one of those words which have almost lost their value through too common usage, but Cyprus really is a tragedy in the true sense—an affair of good intentions gone awry, of disaster springing from conflicting virtues, of love and murder mixed. “Yes,” said one Cypriot, “even Dighenis, though he fights the British, really loves them. But he will have to go on killing them—with regret, even with affection.” This is the heart of the tragedy: that for a strange mixture of reasons, historical and legendary, the Greeks both on the mainland and in the island are passionately, romantically pro-British.

The poignancy of this situation is sadly and beautifully caught by Lawrence Durrell. He is a philhellene but not the woolly kind. He has learned to know the Levant by living there. He is a poet with a sense of humor, a Conservative but not a politician.