Reading As Writing: “Athyr”

“In the month of Athyr” first appeared in Alexandria, in the literary magazine Grammata, in the spring of 1917. Rumor has it that, as soon as Cavafy finished it, he sent word to the editor, Stefanos Pargas, to drop by his house to collect it for publication. Pargas found the poet “restless and jittery, pacing up and down in the small living room and the corridor, with the manuscript projecting from his pocket and his hands locked behind his back.” “Take it, dear man, this masterpiece,” Cavafy reportedly exclaimed as he handed him the manuscript, “take it, for it is burning my hands” (Pieridis, 1965, p. 73).