These are poems born of facets and interrogations of citizenship and national dissolution in the Greek cultural landscape of economic austerity, of the self in love, too, with topoi imbued with history, eros, and loss. The terrains are multiple and transient, the subjects both quotidian and extraordinary in their lyric consciousness of time.
When I sit down to read Adrianne Kalfopoulou's poems or essays, I find myself sitting up straighter, more awake and attentive to the words in front of me, to the world. Her most recent book, A History of Too Much, responds to the Greek Euro crisis with tenderness, ferocity, and urgency that startles and dazzles. The images evoked and questions posed haven't left me-just as was the case with her essay "Transitional Object, a Grammar for Letting Go" that we had the honor of publishing. Adrianne was kind enough to chat with me via email about her creative process, working across genres, and the complex bittersweetness of her work. -Ashley Farmer
