Spokesman Books

Based in Athens, The Paragraph offers an informed and humorous perspective on Greek and Global affairs, born of a longstanding relationship with the Russell Foundation (the 'Northern Garrison'). It suggests some ways in which people outside Greece can help in the long struggle to reverse austerity and all its ills.   *** Hello dear Paragraph readers, We that hope all of you, here and abroad, are doing OK. We apologise for the delay in informing you about the atmosphere here in Athens after the recent election, the resounding SYRIZA victory, and the formation of the new patriotic coalition government in Greece. Why the delay? There were, as you shall see, many events taking place and also we were (as most of the Greeks, regardless of what they voted for) somehow overwhelmed by emotion. What would come out would be (very mediocre) poetry, but not a good report... In order to make our report more useful we decided to ...

Paragraph 6-8-12 Dear friends, hello After weeks of complete absence from your screens, and the cascade of events occuring during this time, this mail might take the charachter of a letter, more than that of a brief Paragraph dispatch. We will deal here with many news, starting with the ... weather here: horendously hot; the hottest summer we remember since we were doing national service in the Navy, way back then, 1988 ... We do not intend to talk about the weather, albeit with all those rapid (and worrisome) developments in Syria one could be easily tempted to do just that ... Incidentally, this ("talking about the weather") is what most political parties do in Greece regarding Syria, and possibly with with good reason. Given the terrible socioeconomic straits Greece is now going through (whose effect is mirrored in the apprehension one discerns in every Greek, of all social strada and persuassions) many a politician know that anything they say on this matter might ...