The Greek Community of Melbourne hosted a poetry event by Dimitris Tzoumacas last Sunday at its mezzanine level in collaboration with the Greek-Australian Cultural League and the Hellenic Writers’ Association of Australia.
Mr Tzoumacas who migrated to Australian in 1974, worked as a journalist for Australian newspapers and magazines and taught at the Universities of New South Wales and Macquarie Sydney, while later on he served in the Press Office of the Consulate General of Greece in Sydney. After 2006, he returned to Greece where he took up the role of director of the Journalism Directorate of the General Secretariat of Information (former Press Ministry) until his retirement.
It was in Australia where his poetic flair and passion flourished and many of his writings were released. Of these books, Merry Sydney (1998) has been taught at all three tiers of Australia’s education system and the author has been repeatedly honoured with grants from the Australian Arts Council.
The highlight of the event was Mr Tzoumacas’ impassioned and flamboyant readings of passages of some of his poems – Merry Sydney, The Woman with Thorns in her Neck and ‘Tiger and Chameleon’.