Giorgos Seferis

Forster was a friend, and visited when he was ambassador in London and writing at 3 a.m. Seferis corresponded with Eliot and (20 years after first being influenced by him) met him: he said he was thinking of giving up his diplomatic job for interfering too much with the subconscious. Valaoritis’ 20-year correspondence with him became a best-selling book; the poets Palamas and Sikelianos were also good friends. Miller gave him his diary as a present when he had to leave Greece, and Durrell wrote enthustically about going to see him at Katsimbalis’s and “giving modern lit a bashing” with them.