A few months later, alongside Alexis Tsipras, the literary… distillation of Prokopis Pavlopoulos.

From the prose of a “thrilling narrative, in 11+1 chapters,” from the “vivid political thriller” penned by the former prime minister to the poetic prose of the former President of the Republic, featuring works from his… adolescence to the present.

It is this convergence that brings together the… historically connected former members of the state and political establishment on the… literary path. Political storytellers, writers, and poets off the cuff…

In his book *Ithaca*, Tsipras describes a “relationship of honesty, mutual respect, and meaningful communication” with Prokopis Pavlopoulos.

The murder of Alexandros Grigoropoulos, the unprecedented incidents that followed the tragic event in December 2008, and the accusations that SYRIZA was fanning the flames of chaos, brought to the fore—according to Tsipras—Prokopis Pavlopoulos, later President of the Republic, as a prominent political figure. With whom, as the author Tsipras reveals, he was in daily contact while Athens was burning.

“On the afternoon of December 6, 2008, we were decorating the Christmas tree for the first time in our new home, at 40 Giannitson Street in Ano Kypseli, where a year earlier Betty and I had decided to live together. Suddenly, a phone call from a friend, who happened to be having a drink somewhere on Valtetsiou Street in Exarchia, interrupted our family’s peace: “A 16-year-old boy was shot by a police officer. Chaos is breaking out in Exarchia”…

From the sixth-floor balcony on Giannitson Street, thick plumes of smoke could be seen rising in various spots throughout the city center. The days that followed were days of rage. Anger and a desire for vengeance over the unjust death of Alexandros prevailed. The Karamanlis government ultimately managed to handle the major crisis without irreparable consequences, something that was by no means certain at the outset. A decisive role was also played by the level-headed stance of the then Minister of Public Order, Prokopis Pavlopoulos, who, in contrast to extreme proposals that called for even the army to be deployed on the streets, demonstrated composure and self-restraint.

Pavlopoulos, as a professor of public law at the Athens Law School, had both experience and an understanding of youthful impulsiveness, as well as of how to communicate with the various groups of the extra-parliamentary Left and the anarchist movement.

During those hours he was in constant, daily contact with me, with a sincere desire to prevent the worst from happening—that is, to keep the violence from escalating into completely uncontrollable forms that would lead to more casualties and destruction. That was when a relationship of honesty, mutual respect, and meaningful communication began to take shape between us—a relationship that, over time, was destined to play a decisive role in my decision to nominate him for the office of President of the Republic.”

Poetic sensibilities…

Whereas Alexis Tsipras recognizes in Pavlopoulos a “thoughtful politician”—during whose tenure at the Ministry of Public Order a 16-year-old was killed by a police officer’s gunfire and Athens was ablaze— the writer Pavlopoulos steps in to attest to his sensibilities in writing:

“Joy, a reflection on the steppe of sorrow. Glory, a moving celebration in the calendar of vanity. The dream, a deceptive companion in the meadow of contemplation. Hope, a line that fades as it seeks the horizon of a pointless memory,” are the words of the poet, the… other Pavlopoulos, who erases and writes verses and… quatrains from his teenage years.

In fact, some of his poems were published under a pseudonym, until his first poetry collection, titled “Stalactites from Four Stanzas,” by Gutenberg Publications, accompanied by thirteen etchings by our great painter Yannis Psychopedis.

The former President of the Republic, a distinguished constitutional scholar and academic, has chosen a completely different medium to communicate with his readership. He steps outside the bounds of his public and institutional role and addresses his audience as a creator, revealing a favorite pastime of his dating back to his… school days.

Although his public image had been identified for decades with politics, law, and university teaching, poetry has always been a parallel avenue of expression for Prokopis Pavlopoulos. From his teenage years to the present day. And, as all signs indicate, now was the time—as if… he were envious of Tsipras’s literary endeavor—that he decided to officially share this personal work of his.

Prokopis Pavlopoulos recounts his own story of thoughts and feelings in… poetic language, at a time roughly parallel to Tsipras’s historical narrative, through his journey to Ithaca. Thoughts, ideas, experiences, inner quests, and emotions, drops in his life, which take shape slowly, through a long process of accumulation. Just like stalactites.

With the publication of this collection, Prokopis Pavlopoulos may not be seeking merely a literary statement, but also a reminder that behind public offices there are often creative paths that remain unknown to the general public.

He states that he is now free and… ready for any criticism, noting to his friends Aeschylus’s saying from “Agamemnon”: “But the one who is free from envy is not jealous.”

And he likely isn’t seeking to expand his recognition, his public image, his contributions, or his body of work, nor does a Tsipras-style rebranding appear to be on the horizon. Moreover, the evidence suggests that… he is held in higher esteem than other poets, as in 2022 the Academy of Athens elected him as a full member and rejected Titos Patrikios, Michalis Ganas, and Nasos Vagenas…