A lecture entitled «Cavafy and Emotions» will be held tomorrow 18-9-2014 at 19:00 at the Melbourne’s Ithacan Philanthropic Society.

It is commonplace that art and literature express feelings and emotions and at the same time influence emotively their aCavafyudience. The lonely tear of a sensitive movie viewer or the spontaneous outburst of laughter of the audience of a play are not rare phenomena. But, how do literature and art evoke emotions? What is happening to the audience during the process of emotive response? What type of emotions are they? Are they real or imaginary?

Dr. Anthony Dracopoulos, Chair of the department of Modern Greek at the University of Sydney will attempt to shed light on these questions, using as a frame of reference Cavafy’s poetry. It will explore a variety of emotive responses to Cavafy’s poetry, with particular emphasis to the affective engagement made possible by the different levels of identification with the poet’s characters.

Dr. Anthony Dracopoulos teaches Modern Greek and Comparative Literature. He has published extensively on Greek Modernism, George Seferis and C.P. Cavafy. He is the author of G. Seferis and Criticism: The Reception of Seferis’ Work (1931-1971), Athens: Plethron, 2002 and C. P. Cavafy: The Open Work, Athens: Topos, 2013.