Philip Sherrard

Philip Sherrard (1922-1995) was an author, poet, translator, academic, theologian, and advocate of the Greek Orthodox tradition. Born in Oxford, he studied at Cambridge and London, and spent many years in Greece, on the island of Evia, with his partner Denise Harvey. He believed that the post-Byzantine culture of Greece was essentially and organically linked to the spiritual tradition of the Eastern Orthodox Church, dedicating much of his life to conveying this idea, particularly in the field of modern Greek poetry. His work is pioneering in many areas, opening new paths in myth and imagination, as well as in theology. His legacy includes translations into English of works by A. Sikelianos, C. P. Cavafy, G. Seferis, and O. Elytis, which have left a significant mark on Greek literature abroad. Philip Sherrard was well-known for his many contributions to the understanding and promotion of the literature and thought of the Greek world. He was educated in Cambridge and London. Among his most notable works in this respect are: "The Marble Threshing Floor: Studies in Modern Greek Poetry"; "The Greek East and the Latin West"; "Constantinople: the Iconography of a Sacred City"; "Athos, the Holy Mountain"; "The Pursuit of Greece"; "The Wound of Greece"; and his translations, in collaboration with Edmund Keeley, of the poetry of Cavafy, Sicelianos, Seferis, and Elytis. He was also the translator and editor (with G. E. H. Palmer and Kallistos Ware) of "The Philokalia", a collection of texts by the spiritual masters of the Orthodox Christian tradition. A book of his own poetry was published in the last year of his life. A profound, committed, and imaginative thinker, his theological and metaphysical writings embrace a wide range of subjects, from the study of the division of Christendom into the Greek East and the Latin West, to the spiritualized potential of sexual love and the restoration of a sacred cosmology. He spent part of his life in Evia, Greece.