After the establishment of the first Greek State (1831) and the transference of the capital from Nafplion to Athens (1833) many Greeks that lived in European countries returned to independent Greece. Among them there were also a few scholars, the Phanariots, who resided in Constantinople and the Danubian reigns, holding high positions in the Administration of the Ottoman State, and who now came to Greece to help in the intellectual and political reconstruction of the new State.
Phanariots, being experienced in the administrative and diplomatic bureaucracy, moved into the most responsible official positions in the newly established state. At the same time, being highly educated they played a leading role in the intellectual reconstruction, by creating the Athenian School, the first literary school of the first independent Greek State. Common characteristics of the Phanariots were their speaking the French language, their writing in a scholarly katharevousa and their serious influences by the Europeans, especially the French romanticist writers. For this reason the Athenian School was named by literary critics as the Romanticist Athenian School, precisely because it represents the Greek version of Romanticism.
Romanticism was an intellectual and artistic movement that appeared in Europe, and especially in France, since the late 18th century until mid 19th century as a reaction to classicism and rationalism of the previous centuries. Romanticism influenced all arts as well as people’s way of living; this is why, among others, it denotes a way of life. It stressed the role of feelings, imagination, spontaneity, and the emotional and “dreamy” element. Their main themes were nature, adventure, freedom, love, heroism, etc. The romanticists promoted the comeback to the roots of popular civilization. That is, instead of mimicing Homer and the ancient tragic writers they rather aimed at the model of Shakespeare and Byron. In Greece the movement appeared almost at the same time as in France and it dominated Greek poetry for approximately fifty entire years.
In independent Greece, Romanticism found fertile ground and fully dominated literature, since the very acute social, economic and political problems of the small State favoured the escape to realms of imagination or the glorious Greek past. The New Greek State necessitated a new ideal, thus the Phanariots wished to create a new kind of literature, based on the emerging new national needs. National self-determination was an absolute imperative, by means of constructing a national ideology that would introduce the new State in the circle of the independent States of Europe. For this reason the liberal ideology of the Enlightenment and the enthusiasm of the Revolution of ’21 were marginalized. This was the prevalent purpose of literary expression, that, mainly by means of literary competitions, served the aim of structuring the new national ideology on the basis of the cult of ancient times (“archaeolatry”).
Though the impact of the European romanticist movement on Greek writers was extensive, in critical issues, such as the language question, it did not adopt solutions that were already obvious in Europe. For example, the use of the cold, uninspired katharevousa in literature weakened any other virtue in the Greek romanticists’ works and made them unattractive for the average reader.
The characteristics of the Athenian School writers were the following: usage of katharevousa, pretentious and extemporary style, melancholic mood, escape from reality, pessimism, persistence in the idea of death, lack of originality, turn towards the glorious past. These aspects are eminent in all literary production of the Athenian School, in poetry, in prose and in theater alike.
Greek Romanticism was mainly expressed in the field of poetry. Its main representatives were Alexandros Soutsos (1803-1863), Panagiotis Soutsos (1806-1868), Alexandros Rizos Ragkavis (1809-1892), Georgios Zalokostas (1805-1858), Dimitrios Paparigopoulos (1843-1873), Ioannis Karasoutsas (1824 – 1873), Dimosthenis Valavanis (1824 – 1854), Spyridon Vasileiadis (1844 - 1874), and Achilleas Parashos (1838 – 1895).
The historic novel is preponderant in prose with its themes mainly drawn from the Greek Revolution but also older times. Also notable is the presence of works that strayed from the romanticist climate of the time and, hesitantly, introduced a new spirit in prose, by incorporating ethnographic elements (see D. Vikelas, Λουκής Λάρας, P. Kalligas, Θάνος Βλέκας). A special case is the one of Emmanouil Roidis with his work Πάπισσα Ιωάννα via which he indirectly criticizes the drawbacks of his time.
Finally, theater holds a very important position in the realm of Greek Letters in the period 1830 – 1880 together with criticism, with main representatives Dimitrios Vyzantios and Emmanouil Roidis.
Details of Period’s Anthology
A. Writers: 12
Β. Texts: 23
1. Poetry: five (5)
2. Prose (novel, short story): four (4)
3. Theater: one (1)
4. Criticism – Feature: one (1)
5. Essay: One (1)
C. Text language: katharevousa