The poet and lyricist Michalis Ganas has passed away. Many of his poems have been set to music by important Greek and foreign composers
The poet and lyricist Michalis Ganas has passed away. Ganas was born in Tsamandas Thesprotias in 1944 and lived the first years of his life in Eastern European countries. He studied at the Law School of the University of Athens and worked as a bookseller, as an editor of television and radio programs and as a copywriter.
Many of his poems have been set to music by important Greek and foreign composers such as Mikis Theodorakis, Thanasis Gaiphyllias, Dimitris Papadimitriou and Nikos Xydakis. Speaking to Lifo he had said: “They say that poetry is the most difficult kind of literature. For me it is the easiest. I don’t want to say that I write well, but my hand goes easier. My prose, Motherland, is sixty pages on a subject on which a normal prose writer could write a trilogy.”
About the lyric writing he said: “the lyricist’s suit is not different, there are just some small differences. The songs I’ve written I love very much. The ones that worked and the ones that didn’t work. I worked a lot with orders on ready-made tunes. It can be somebody’s kind of castration, but also “Everything Reminds You” was written on a melody. I would have lost some of my best songs if I hadn’t gone into that gutter. I just kept in mind when I was writing the lyrics that the listener didn’t it has the ability to come back, like the reader. Writing should not be simplistic, but straightforward. It’s a principle for me, something like a military art.”
In 1994 he was honored with the 2nd State Poetry Prize for his work “Paralogi” and in 2011 he was awarded for his entire poetic work by the Academy of Athens. His works have been translated into German, French, Italian and Albanian and have been anthologized in English, Bulgarian, French, German, Georgian, Spanish, Italian, Chinese, Hungarian, Polish, Romanian, Czech and Finnish.
His works:
A Christmas Story, Ink, 2014
Poems 1978-2012, Melani, 2013
Absinthe, Melani, 2012
Women: short and very short stories, Melani, 2010.
Motherland: a story, Melani, 2007 (1st edition: Keimena, 1981) (reprint: Kastaniotis, 1989)
Black stones. Kastaniotis, 2007 (1st edition: Keimena, 1980. reprint: Kastaniotis, 1993)
Song of Songs, Melani, 2005 (arrangement)
Gianna Giannena, Kastaniotis, 2004 (1st edition: 1989)
The smoker’s sleep, Kastaniotis, 2003.
Lyrics. Ink, 2002
The little ones: 1969-1999: unknown and known poems, Kastaniotis, 2000 Sedentary dinner. Kastaniotis, 1994 (1st edition: Texts, 1978)
Excuse me. Athens, Kastaniotis, 1993.
Poetry. Athens, Kastaniotis, 1975. Pg.: 85.
Source :Skai
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