Dimitrios I. Antoniou

D.I. Antoniou (1906-1994) Dimitrios Antoniou was born in Beira, Mozambique, and hailed from a prominent shipping family from Kasos. He spent his early childhood in his birthplace and in Suez, and completed his secondary education in Athens, where he settled with his family in 1912. He studied at the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Athens and simultaneously engaged in learning foreign languages and amateur pursuits in mineralogy, botany, entomology, zoology, and music. From 1928, he pursued a military career in the merchant navy, reaching the rank of captain. He retired in 1968. During the Greco-German War, he served as a reserve officer on the destroyer Keios. As a young man, he joined the circle of Palamas and became acquainted with Konstantinos Tsatsos, Giorgos Seferis, Odysseas Elytis, and other writers of the so-called Generation of the '30s, with whom he collaborated in the renewal of Greek poetic expression. He made his literary debut in 1936 in the pages of "Nea Grammata" with the publication of poems that were favorably reviewed by Giorgos Seferis. He published three poetry collections ("Poems," "Indies" [Second State Poetry Prize, 1967], "Haiku and Tanka" [First State Poetry Prize, 1972]), while many of his works (poems, literary essays, translations) have been published in newspapers and magazines. For more biographical details on D.I. Antoniou, see I.M. Chatzifotis, "Antoniou Dimitrios," in "The Great Encyclopedia of Modern Greek Literature," vol. 2, Athens, Haris Patsis, n.d. [1968], Alexandros Argyriou, "D.I. Antoniou," in "Greek Poetry: Modernist Poets of the Interwar Period" [pp. 200-201 (introduction) and 298 (anthology)], Athens, Sokolis Editions, 1979, "Antoniou Dimitrios," in "World Biographical Dictionary," vol. 1, Athens, Ekdotiki Athinon, 1983, and Alexis Ziras, "Antoniou Dimitrios I.," in "Dictionary of Modern Greek Literature," Athens, Patakis Editions, 2007. (Source: Archive of Greek Authors, EKEBI).