Greek-Australian researcher's talk on Jack Kerouac and the Greek connection

Poet, translator and researcher, George Mouratidis, will present a free online lecture on the topic of Kerouac and the Greek Connection as part of the Greek History and Culture Seminars, offered by the Greek Community of Melbourne.

Researcher and poet George Mouratidis Source: supplied by George Mouratidis

G. Mouratidis' lecture examines Kerouac through the lens of diaspora – as a writer whose vision of America, at once romantic and melancholy, was that of an outsider, looking in.

"Kerouac's sense of "home" – growing up in the working-class French-Canadian and Greek migrant community of Lowell, Massachusetts – for him served as a key counterpoint to the open road and urban bohemias for which he is most celebrated" according to the Greek Community's press release.

"This perpetual dialogue between "Loswell" and "the road" established the  fundamental dualism and ambivalence that informed and shaped the Kerouac's self-identity, language, and his art – a conflict that ism, of course, at the heart of the migrant experience."

George Mouratidis is a Greek-born poet, translator and researcher. He has taught cultural studies at RMIT University and American literature at The University of Melbourne, where he co-founded the Living Poetry Sessions with writer-poet Lucy Van and is completing his doctorate on the politics and poetics of the Beat Generation.

He was a contributing editor of Jack Kerouac’s On The Road: The Original Scroll and is the translator of Noted Transparencies (Owl, 2016) by Greek-language poet Nikos Nomikos, with whom he continues to work closely. George Mouratidis' debut poetry collection, Angel Frankenstein (Soul Bay Press) was published in 2018.