The Report to Greco is the key book for the life and work of Nikos Kazantzakis. It is a unique autobiography that contains altered or even unaltered segments from letters, diaries, notebooks, as well as excerpts from his other works, with a novelistic character, which compose a study on ultimate problems, a story of an inner journey, the personification of his spiritual wandering.

Furthermore, this work, which Kazantzakis conceived at the height of his life, is ultimately realized at the turning point of his existence and takes on the character of a study of death, as a "recap" of a life filled with intensity and contemplation, as what interests the author here, and what he considers the moral obligation of every man and his highest debt, is to give an account "of the red line that marks his journey among people, passions, and ideas".

Thus, Kazantzakis's personal experiences and memories inevitably become part of the collective consciousness, a common meeting place for people who share the same fate. Kazantzakis, at the dusk of his life, like another Odysseus, returns to his homeland and makes the report to his general: the Report to Greco.

"You will find, therefore, reader, on these pages the red line, made of drops of my blood, that marks my journey among people, passions, and ideas. Every person worthy of being called a son of man carries his cross and climbs his Golgotha; many, the majority, reach the first, the second step, gasp, collapse in the middle of the journey, and do not reach the top of Golgotha – I mean the top of their duty – to be crucified, to resurrect, and to save their soul. They lose heart, fear to be crucified, and do not know that crucifixion is the only way to resurrection, there is no other."