ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to highlight the national basis of literature in Greece indirectly, or rather by reference to its inverse. While interest in poetry was minimal, interest in prose fiction was much more intense and it was in translations rather than original works. The chapter explores more on numbers than on the texts themselves, on a quantitative rather than a qualitative analysis; some preliminary remarks are thus called for. Ermoupolis, capital of the island of Syros, was a refugee town born of the Revolution of 1821. In 1830 it had begun to resemble a city; by 1840 it may have been slightly smaller than Athens in terms of population but was far wealthier. Moving to Smyrna, we should bear in mind that the Greek presence only became substantial in the last quarter of the eighteenth century. We should also recall the Philological Gymnasion and the presence of Konstantinos Oikonomos, who taught his pupils Modern Greek poetics even before the Revolution.
