Category Archives: An Adventure: Paddy’s Biography by Artemis Cooper

Patrick Leigh Fermor in Greece – a talk by Artemis Cooper

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Paddy’s biographer and good friend, Artemis Cooper, will talk about his life in Greece at the Gannadius Library in Athens at 7.00 pm on 24 May 2012. 

Full details of the event can be found here.

Biographer Artemis Cooper, who is preparing a biography of Patrick Leigh Fermor, will trace his life, experiences, and legacy in Greece from his early travels to the end of his life, on 10 June 2011. She will talk about what drew Patrick Leigh Fermor to Greece in the first place; his ‘participation’ in the Venizelist rebellion of 1935; his early travels in Thrace and Macedonia, and first encounters with the Sarakatsani; his experiences in the war on the Albanian front and Crete, as well as the post-war explorations of Greece that produced Mani and Roumeli. She will also touch on the Cyprus years; his friendship with George Seferis, George Katsimbalis, and Nicos Hadjikyriacos Ghika; how he and his wife came to settle in Kardamyli, and built their house with the architect Nicos Hadjimichalis; how the Greek translation of Mani was undertaken by Tzannis Tzannatakis, while he was in exile in Kythera under the Junta of the Colonels. She will also reflect on his position in the village of Kardamyli and how he is seen in Greece today.

PS – I have been told that there will be a webcast available after the event. I will post the details when I have them.

The Kreipe pennants

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The Kreipe pennants - Copyright Artemis Cooper 2011

The pennants from General Kreipe's car

What happened to the flags on General Kreipe’s car when Paddy abandoned it and joined the main abduction gang? Well here is the story. I am very grateful to Artemis Cooper for submitting this. I hesitate to say that this is a world exclusive, but it probably is! These have not been seen in public since the car drove through the heavily garrisoned town of Heraklion with the General in April 1944.

As I’m sure you know, just before abandoning the General’s car on the night of the abduction of Gen Kreipe, Paddy and George Tyrakis ripped off the two metal pennants that stood proudly on the bonnet. One might argue that, combined with Billy’s confident driving, it was those pennants that had let the car pass unchallenged through 22 German checkpoints! Since Billy had driven the car the pennants were given to him; and after his death, Billy’s daughters – Gabriella Bullock and Isabella Cole – felt that Paddy should have them. Paddy held onto them for many years, very much under wraps. I think the main reason he kept them hidden was because he had always felt so wretched about the death of Alfred Fenske, the General’s chauffeur.

They were kept in a tin trunk in his study, and very few people knew they were there. He showed them to me only once. The reason for that was so that I should be aware that after his death, they were to go to the Rethymnon Museum of History and Folklore. This had been arranged in the 1990s, with the encouragement of Niko Kokonas.

In August the flags were given to the Rethymnon Museum, according to Paddy’s instructions.

I have a photo of the flags. They stand about 15″ high, the triangular pennant sticking out about 12″. The first is painted red, white and black in horizontal lines, like the German flag. The other shows the gold Nazi eagle with outspread wings perched on a wreath, embroidered onto a piece of grey fabric which is then mounted onto the metal pennant.

I hope this is a real joy to all the Ill Met by Moonlight fans out there.

This article and photograph copyright Artemis Cooper 2011

Leigh Fermor’s hidden letters to see the light

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It has been 15 years in the making but at last Artemis Cooper’s official biography of Sir Patrick Leigh Fermor has got a publication date. Cooper was first contracted to write an account of the life of her friend, the great travel writer, back in the Nineties but Leigh Fermor had requested that it was not to be published until after his death, which came last Friday at the grand age of 96.  Cooper, wife of historian Antony Beevor and daughter of John Julius Norwich, is now expecting the book to come out late next year with John Murray, also Sir Paddy’s publisher. The delay is believed to be down to a number of private letters — possibly to his late wife, Joan Leigh Fermor— which he did not want to be in the public sphere while he was still alive. Sir Patrick was in his eighties when the book was commissioned and friends confess that they did not expect such a long wait. As a young man he walked across Europe and swam the Bosphorus. He lived for many years in the Peloponnese. Recently, his correspondence with the Duchess of Devonshire, edited by Charlotte Mosley, was published.Cooper, administrator of the Duff Cooper literary prize in memory of her grandfather, is still holding back the exciting details of the book. “It’s not finished yet,” she tells me, dodging questions about the content. “We’ll do it in time for Christmas next year.” Leigh Fermor’s funeral will be held on Thursday in the village of Dumbleton in Gloucestershire, where Joan is buried.

From the Londoner’s Diary in The Evening Standard, 14 June 2011

Pre-ordering Artemis Cooper’s biography of Patrick Leigh Fermor

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Artemis Cooper

Just a quick note to regular readers and those who search for this book – there are many Google searches for this proposed biography.

It came to my attention that a book called Biography of Patrick Leigh Fermor by Artemis Cooper and Antony Beevor is due to be published by Penguin in September 2011. At least that is what it says on Amazon and a number of on-line book sites.

I contacted Amelia Fainey who is Publicity Director for Penguin books as my belief was that the agreement (and if I recall correctly actually mentioned in In Tearing Haste) is that the book will be published after Paddy’s death.

Amelia responded thus:

Hello

I’m afraid we don’t have a date scheduled for this yet – possibly 2013 – certainly not this September!

A

So, if you were hoping for a book this autumn you will have to wait …. at least two years, and I suspect a lot longer than that.

Related article:

A biography of Paddy by Artemis Cooper?
Artemis Cooper talks about Words of Mercury

A biography of Paddy by Artemis Cooper?

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There are some tough jobs around, but few could be tougher than writing a biography of Patrick Leigh Fermor. However, according to the acknowledgements section of “In Tearing Haste” by Charlotte Mosley, Artemis Cooper is apparently doing so; ‘… to Artemis Cooper, who is preparing a biography of Paddy’. Artemis of course edited “Words of Mercury” (2003).

Given that we have been waiting twenty four years for “Vol 3” what are the chances of Artemis’ biography being published before that volume? Not great I would have thought. But what a challenge to write about the life of one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century. I wish her the best of luck!