Census

by Panos Ioannides

A novel of rare literary and philosophical aesthetic | Alithia Daily

A strongly enigmatic and symbolic novel | Athens Review of Books

Set in the middle of the twentieth century in a mountainous Cypriot village, Census follows the pregnancy of cancer patient Maria. She conceives after a night with the angelically handsome Michael, visiting from Patmos, the island of John’s Revelation. The gestation culminates in the “nativity” of an invisible Christ in a Nicosia clinic.

Though incorporeal, scentless and colourless, the life-giving force that is liberated from Maria’s womb, brings about premature efflorescence and a diffusion of aromas across the clinic’s flower pots. Akin to healing energy, it begins curing the spiritual and psychosomatic ailments of all those it overshadows, urging the island’s medical community to dedicate their life to studying and utilising this unknown new energy.

Census is both a heretic allegory of the nativity and a cathartic retort to the satanic messages of Roman Polanski’s renowned horror film Rosemary’s Baby. Boasting repeated editions in Greece and Cyprus, this award-winning novel by Panos Ioannides, replete with magical realism, is riveting in terms of conception and execution: a sacred metaphysical thriller that redeems and purifies the reader. A masterpiece in the art of fiction and the recipient of the Cyprus National Prize for Literature, 1973.

Additional reviews:

His voice is graced with solid psychological poise and unique sharpness of the spirit equivalent to a surgical scalpel | Phileleftheros Daily

An excellent artisan of composite plot | Phileleftheros Daily

An innovative novel that significantly predates Umberto Eco’s or Dan Brown’s composite or “bestselling” achievements | Nea Epochi Magazine

Concise, elliptical sentences, the seemingly simplified wording (from a master) are put aside to make room for a language that endeavours to serve as a figure of extra-logical and extra-worldly transcendences. Eloquence, in the best possible meaning of the term, accompanies those passages of the book where cosmic drama cedes its place to metaphysical mystery | Andreas Christophides, Literary Critic

NATIONAL PRIZE FOR LITERATURE, 1973 - Cyprus

268 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 7, 2015

About the author

Panos Ioannides (Πάνος Ιωαννίδης) was born in Famagusta, Cyprus, in 1935. He studied Mass Communications and Sociology in the USA and Canada. He served as Director of Radio and Television Programmes at the Cyprus Broadcasting Corporation. He has been writing literature, mostly prose and theatre, since 1955. Works of his have been translated and published in their entirety or in parts in French, German, English, Russian, Romanian, Chinese, Hungarian, Polish, Serbo-Croat, Turkish, Persian, Bulgarian, Swedish, and other languages. His plays Gregory, Peter the First, The Suitcase, and Ventriloquists have been staged in Greece, England, USA and Germany. He served as Chairman of the Cyprus Theatre Organization (ThOK) Repertory Committee, and as President of the Cyprus PEN Centre. He lives in Nicosia, Cyprus.

PUBLISHED WORKS

PROSE
IN ETHERIAL CYPRUS, short stories, G.Fexis Publications, Athens, 1964
CYPRUS EPICS, short stories, P.K.I. Publications, Cyprus, 1968
KRONAKA, VOLUMES I & II, novellas and short stories, I.M. Publications, Cyprus 1970 and 1972
CENSUS, novel, I.M. Publications, Cyprus, 1973
Second edition, Ledra Publications, Athens, 1993
THE UNSEEN ASPECT, novellas and short stories, Kinyras Publications, Cyprus, 1979
THREE PARABLES BY NICOLAOS KEYS, journalist, novellas, Kinyras Publications, Cyprus, 1989
THE UNBEARABLE PATRIOTISM OF P.F.K., novel, Kinyras Publications, Cyprus, 1989
Second Edition, Kastaniotis Publications, Athens 1990
SAILING, VOLUMES I & II, novellas and short stories, Alassia Publications, Cyprus 1992
DEVAS, novel, Armida Publications, Cyprus 2006
AMERICA '62, novel, Armida Publications, Cyprus December 2007

PLAYS
PYGMALION AND GALATIA, Cyprus 1973
YOU, WHO DIED FOR THE LIGHT, Cyprus 1962
Revised edition, Armida Publications, Cyprus 2004
THREE PLAYS (The Bath, Ventriloquists, Gregory), Kinyras Publications, Cyprus 1973
ONESILUS, Proodos Publications, Cyprus 1981
THREE ONE-ACT PLAYS (The Suitcase, Dry Martini, Cousins), P.K.I. Publications, Cyprus 1984
PETER THE FIRST, P.K.I. Publications, Cyprus 1984
FOTINOS, Armida Publications, Cyprus 2000
MEMORIAL SERVICE, SIMAE Publications, Cyprus 2002
LEONTIOS AND SMYRNA, Armida Publications, Cyprus 2005-09-26
POETRY
SONG OF SHIGERU AND OTHER POEMS, Cyprus 1966
IN PARENTHESIS, Armida Publications, Cyprus 2000

ANTHOLOGIES
CYPRUS HIGHLIGHTS, with Leonidas Malenis, Cyprus 1963
ANTHOLOGY OF CYPRIOT SHORT-STORIES, with Andreas Christofides, I.M. Publications, Cyprus 1969
ANTHOLOGY OF THE EOKA STRUGGLE, I.M. Publications, Cyprus 1973
FACE OF AN ISLAND, 24 short stories from Cyprus in English, Armida Publications, Cyprus 1997
FACE OF AN ISLAND, 25 Cypriot poets translated in English, Armida Publications, Cyprus, 2000
TV AND CINEMA SCENARIOS
GREGORY: Directed by Evis Gavrielides, the televised version was shown by the CyBCTV, TV
Greece and other European TV Stations, as well as by the National TV Network of Australia.
ASINOU: A documentary on the Chapel of Asinou, directed by Panos Ioannides. This church belongs
to a group of nine Troodos Mountain Churches included in the World Heritage Monuments selected
by UNESCO. The documentary was shown in Cyprus, Greece and other countries.
THE TILLYRIA BOMBINGS: Documentary filmed by the writer in Tillyria district, Paphos, during the
bombing of this district of Cyprus by the Turkish air force in 1964.
KYRIAKOS MATSIS: Documentary on the life of the hero of the Cyprus liberation struggle, Kyriakos
Matsis.
PETER THE FIRST: Scenario for the historical TV series of eleven, forty-five minute episodes. The
series was shown in Cyprus and by the CyBC Satellite TV.
TROUBLED YEARS: Scenario for a TV series of the same name, in collaboration with Hera Genagritou.
It was shown on MEGA TV, Cyprus.
TRANSLATED WORKS
Works of Panos Ioannides have been translated and published in their entirety or in parts, in various
languages.
POEMS: French translation of Song for Shigeru and other poems

Reviews

[Simona · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is about contemporary nativity - birth of the healing energy, and the story/allegory is dense packed with symbolism, magical realism, philosophy, metaphysical questions ... I liked the first part of the story where Maria and Joseph arrived in the village, but I was lost in the second part when strange things started ... too heavy in symbolism, and the writing in the second part is too experimental for my taste.

[Sara G · Rating 2 out of 5]

God is dead! Or alive! Or something, idk, I'm not a Christian. Idk why I picked this up but it was boring? Not that confusing, like other reviews said, but more pointless from where I was standing. idk idk

[Kyriakos Sorokkou]

This is the first Cypriot magical realism novel I have ever read. And, this is the first Cypriot magical realism novel that was ever written.
Poetic, enigmatic, symbolic, mysterious. . . confusing and all over the place.
It was a short novel (240 pages) but I had difficulty in understanding whose point of view I was reading each time. Sometimes the paragraphs were too short just a few lines of poetic words and phrases. Sometimes the dialogues were mute dots . . . . .? An experimental format.
Critics said that every single word in this book counts but I felt confused. I didn't really know what was going on.
To give you the gist. Maria and Joseph Akritas (allusion to Christ's foster parents) come to settle in a mountainous village in Cyprus (Spilia). There, Maria meets the angelic young man Michael (allusion to Archangel Michael) and a couple of elf-looking elders from Russia(?) angels? Maria has intercourse with Michael and she conceives an entity that I didn't really understand what it was exactly. If Rosemary's baby was the product of a satanic union, this 'baby' is the product of an angelic union. The ending is very open and I have to say I will certainly re-read this in the original Greek. It's 3.5 stars from me but I will return in a few months.
P.S. Not very likeable characters, they didn't see human enough to me. They were caricatures, symbolic puppets to me. This novel since it was a magical realism one had the feeling of Gabriel Garcia Márquez's "100 Years of Solitude". I expected more, probably