[ALBSA-Info] Virgina Wolf:1906 Albanian Athens?

[Bejko, Kreshnik]

Athens, 16 September 1906 
It is worth quoting briefly here Virginia Woolf's description of Athens, and
one can not escape the feeling that 16 september 1906 comes perilously close
in time to James Joyce's own Ulysses Bloom's Day.. Woolf gives a realistic
if slight elitist account of the Greek capital, a city having at that time a
conspicuous Albanian presence:

"The poorer people of Athens - & all the people seem poor- have a pleasant
habit of longing up here in the evening, when their work is done; just as we
stroll in our parks. They sit about on classic marble, chatting & knitting;
but they do not vulgarise the place as we Tourists must do; but rather make
it human and familiar.
The people of Athens are, of course, no more Athenian than I am. They do not
understand the Greek of the age of Pericles - when I speak it. Not are their
features more classic than their speech: the Turk and the Albanian & Franks
- it seems- have produced a common type enough. It is dark and dusky, small
of stature, & not very well grown. It is true that the streets are dignified
by the presence of many rustics, in their Albanian dress; the men wear thick
white coats, kilts, much pleated; & long gaiters. But this you may see
written in a dozen guide books. I have seen no native women; & indeed you
see very few women. The streets are crowded with men drinking & smoking in
the open air, even, in the country, sleeping beneath the wall; but the women
keep within. You generally see them leading children, or looking from an
upper window, where, presumably, they work. But the mind has no difficulty
in making brigands."