Tolis Nikiforou

Tolis Nikiforou was born in Thessaloniki in 1938. His parents were refugees from Asia Minor and Eastern Rumelia. He studied business administration and worked as a bank employee, translator-interpreter, and systems analyst in Thessaloniki, Athens, and London. After the end of the dictatorship, he permanently returned to Thessaloniki, working as a business organization consultant until 1999. A regular contributor to the magazine "Nea Poreia" since the mid-1970s, he also served as vice president of the Northern Greece Literary and Arts Club and the Panhellenic Cultural Movement. He was also a board member of the Thessaloniki Writers' Society and the Artistic Committee of the National Theatre of Northern Greece. He made his literary debut in 1966 with the long poem "The Unburied." Among his works published by "Nea Poreia" are the poetry collections "The Double Alpha of Love" (1994, reissued by Paratiritis, 2002), "Soil in the Sky" (1998), "Deep Blue Like Goodbye" (1999), "A Meadow in the Mist Dreaming" (2002), "The Navigator of Infinity" (collected edition, poems 1966-2002, 2004), the short stories "Egnatia Road" (1973), "The Panther's Eyes" (1996), "Nostos" (2000), and the novel "The Charm of Seconds" (2001). His poetry collection "Secrets and Wonders: The Unexplored Word of Utopia" (2007) was published by "Mandragoras," and his novels "The Yellow Walk in the Grass" (2005), "The Exquisite Pleasure of Rape" (2006), "Desert Island at the Edge of the World" (2009), as well as the short story collection "The Road to Ouranoupoli" (2008), which was awarded the State Short Story Prize in 2009, alongside Argyris Chionis' "Horizontal Height," were published by "Nefeli." He has also written fairy tales for adults. His poems have been translated into many languages and included in both Greek and international anthologies.