The Stratis Tsirkas Library at EKEBI 
 
EKEBI houses a part of the personal library of Stratis Tsirkas, which was donated by the author’s wife, Antigoni Hatziandrea, in 1998.
 
It is a significant collection comprising 3,000 copies of Greek and foreign-language books and periodicals, and is available to the public for study and research on the premises.
 
The importance of the collection lies in the fact that it contains rare editions from the 19th and 20th centuries, with handwritten notes by Tsirkas himself and dedications to the author from other literary figures. Particularly moving is the dedication written by Yiannis Ritsos when he gave Tsirkas a second edition of “Epitafios” from Kedros Publications:
 
“My dear siblings Stratis and Antigoni, how does this seem to you, after 20 years: a poem written about the great strike of Thessaloniki, when I saw a photograph of a mother crying over her murdered son in the middle of the road in May 1936. What do you say, has it withstood the passage of time? Thousands of kisses, your brother Yiannis 15.1.57”
 
This is just one example of the valuable details which a researcher can come across in this collection, which is a revelation about Tsirkas, both the person and the artist. The books – all stamped with his personal Ex Libris stamp, with his name and an engraving of the flying horse Pegasus – demonstrate the author’s love of and interest in Greek and global literature, and there are many books referring to Egypt, Greeks in Egypt and the Greek-Alexandrian poet Constantine Cavafy.

EKEBI is also delighted to house at its offices, six approaches for the Stratis Tsirkas Library, as it considers that these are a valuable aid for researchers into the work of the author.
The specific projects take place as part of a post-graduate seminar in the Modern Greek Philology class of the Philology Department of the University of Crete. Professor Alexis Politis is in charge of the course.