Kostas Soukas

Kostas Soukas (1899-1981). Kostas Soukas was born at the end of the previous century in Piraeus, the son of Dimitrios Soukas and Antigoni Kapsabeli. He spent most of his life in his hometown, working as a journalist, columnist, and literary collaborator for both local and Athenian daily and periodical press, as well as an employee of the Municipal Library of Piraeus. He served his military duty in the navy and participated in a training voyage to Mediterranean ports aboard the warship Averof. He was also the special secretary of the Engineers' Union. From 1960, he settled in Athens, where he lived until his death. His life was marked by the death of his two children and his wife. He made his literary debut with the publication of the novel "Apostolis Karlas" (under the pseudonym K. Chaldaeos) in 1935. He became known in literary circles mainly with the publication of the novella "Sea" in 1943. He was honored with the State Novel Award (1957 for his work "The Criminal Record of an Era"), the Medal of Spiritual Merit from the Municipality of Piraeus, and a few days before his death, the National Society of Greek Writers organized a tribute evening for him, which Soukas was unable to attend. Kostas Soukas belongs to the Greek prose writers of the interwar generation. With clear influences from the works of Dostoevsky and Berdyaev, as well as from the author's journalistic experience, his work is situated in the realm of social realism with notable psychological elements. It is thematically inspired by the lives of sailors and the working-class strata of Piraeus, consistently oriented around the author's concern for the attainment and maintenance of human internal freedom within the framework of social issues. For more biographical details on Kostas Soukas, see Stelios Geranis, "Soukas Kostas," Great Encyclopedia of Modern Greek Literature 12. Athens, Hari Patsi, n.d., and G.D. Paganos, "Kostas Soukas," Interwar Prose: From the First to the Second World War (1914-1939) VIII, pp. 60-82. Athens, Sokolis, 1993. (Source: Archive of Greek Writers, EKEBI).