Doxanio

The story of a tender daughter from Lemnos. She was taken as a slave to be sold to the city of Candia, but she manages to escape and become a spy for the emperor Nicephorus Fokas. She cooperates with him and rallies the terrified crypto-Christians. Ultimately she gives her life for the liberation of Crete. Along with Doxanio's legend, the novel brings to life that gloomy period of Byzantine history - in the middle of the tenth century - a period full of savagery but also of deep mysticism, grandeur and self-sacrifice.

It is exciting to immerse yourself in time, with your inner vision, and to break the silence. To seek the faces that existed before you on your own land, to give them your blood, your passion, the shivering of your soul. And then, to experience alongside them the sacrifice, the greatness of the act. That's how I perceived those towering Cretans. I walked the wide sandy beach of the Byzantine landing at Candia. I've gone back a thousand years and wandered. I needed to do it. Souls remain awake in the solitude of time. They are waiting.

 

Η γυναίκα στα μυθιστορήματά μου, ομιλία στο Γαλλικό Ινστιτούτο Βόλου

Για τη Μαρούλα της Λήμνου και την Δοξανιώ, στο περιοδικό ο αναγνώστης, 2020, “βυζαντινές πριγκίπισσες”

 

Reviews

Δοξανιώ, κριτική Ε.Ν. Μόσχου, Νέα Εστία, αυθεντικό

Δοξανιώ, κριτική Κ. Χωρεάνθη, Διαβάζω, αυθεντικό