Cultural Tourism, Literature and Local Governance: The Case of Erotokritos in Siteia

As opposed to a view held that literature and tourism do not follow compatible paths, the present research describes an emerging bottom-up, local cultural policy at Sitia, in Crete, seeking to attract tourists through literature. This progressively developed policy is governed by local and regional authorities, is associated to multiple activities held by the cultural centre “Stegi Vintsentzos Kornaros”, and is centred around the traditional, long romantic poem Erotokritos, written by Kornaros that is part of local and Greek folk music and oral tradition, since it has been sung by locals for centuries, has been played in theatre and is already used in many local festivities. Using a questionnaire of 135 answers collected from the nearby area of Lasithi (half of which from the city of Sitia), the effects are examined of these broad local policies for promoting literature in association with tourism, their local span, and how the work of Kornaros and Erotokritos could be used to attract international tourism. While most respondents were well aware of the work of Kornaros, a great majority had not participated in municipal activities about it (54,1%), thought that more can be done for developing literature tourism (44,2%), suggested that tourists would be interested to participate in activities about Kornaros and his literature footprint (41,5%), while 63% considered that Erotokritos can attract repetitive tourists. The results emphasize the need to better organize the activities around the touristic value of this specific piece of literature. This finding about the association of literature to tourism may be of more general concern and value for local and regional authorities in Crete and in Greece.