Nikos Kazantzakis

Nikos Kazantzakis was a Greek writer, poet and philosopher, born in Heraklion on Crete on 18 February 1883 and died on 26 October 1957. Crete was then still under Ottoman rule, and the island's struggles and landscape stayed with him all his life. He studied law, spent long periods abroad, and wrote in many forms: novels, poems, plays, travel books and translations. He was deeply influenced by thinkers such as Nietzsche and Bergson, and by his restless search for a spiritual life beyond ordinary belief. His work often explores the tension between flesh and spirit, freedom and duty, and doubt and faith. He is best known outside Greece for Zorba the Greek and The Last Temptation of Christ, the latter of which stirred fierce controversy with religious authorities. Today he is counted among the most widely read modern Greek authors, admired for his vivid storytelling and his bold questions about how to live.