Z /
Vasiles̄ Vasilikos; translated from the Greek by Marilyn Calmann.
- 316 pages : illustrations ; 18 cm.
Translation of Zēta.
In 1963 Gregory Lambrakis, a left wing Greek politician, was murdered in a Salonika street. His death had such a profound effect on the Greek people that 400,000 came in silence to the funeral. Z is a novel based on these events. It is also a terrible and moving condemnation of a democracy tottering on the brink of dictatorship. A corrupt police chief joins forces with a secret fascist organisation to plan the murder. Z's skull is crushed by a blow from a cosh during a political demonstration, but the assassination is carefully planned to look like an accident. The examining magistrate is urged to close the case as quickly as possible. But he refuses to be bullied or bribed one by one the unsavoury details of the conspiracy rise to the surface and Z is dead, but his spirit lives.