The Culture of Greece

The cradle of Western civilization makes no empty boasts of its artistic and cultural prowess. The fact is that many of the concepts we take for granted today, including democracy, first originated thousands of years ago among the Greeks. Greek culture is a result of centuries of evolution and contains influences of the Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire and Ottoman Turks besides legacies of the famed Classical Age.

The first recorded works in the western literary tradition are the epic poems of Homer and Hesiod. Early Greek lyric poetry by Sappho and Pindar defined the genre and Aesop wrote his Fables in the 6th century BC, another genre-defining work. The birthplace of theatre, Classical Greece gave rise to Aeschylus, who introduced the idea of dialogue, as well as Sophocles and Euripides. Aristophanes practically invented the idea of comedy as a theatrical form. Herodotus and Thucydides are often attributed with developing the modern study of history while Polybius first introduced into study the concept of military history. Philosophy entered literature in the dialogues of Plato, while his pupil Aristotle laid the foundations of literary criticism.

Modern Greek literature includes names like Constantine P. Cavafy, Giorgos Seferis (whose works and poems aimed to fuse the literature of Ancient and Modern Greece) and Odysseas Elytis, both of whom won the Nobel Prize for Literature. Nikos Kazantzakis and Vassilis Vassilikos are also world renowned.

The ancient Greeks developed the Doric and Ionic styles of architecture. The latter eventually evolved into the more ornate Corinthian style. The style of ancient Greek temples, a rectangular shape, surrounded by colonnades surmounted by a triangular pediment, built from limestone or marble, remains popular even today. The Parthenon and the Erechtheum in Athens command awe and attract tourists from all over the world.

The Golden age of Greek cinema is universally considered to be the 1950s, in which productions such as Stella, directed by one of Greece's most famous directors Michael Cacoyannis, shot to prominence internationally. Notable actors and directors from this period include Alekos Sakelarios, Nikos Tsiforos, Ellie Lambeti, Dinos Iliopoulos and Irene Papas.