Hymn to Liberty

Item

Title

Hymn to Liberty

Date

28 July 2021

Date Issued

2021

Abstract

The Philippi Festival, in collaboration with the Spleen Theater, presents Dionysios Solomos’ play “Hymn to Liberty”. Years of oppression, enslavement and misery have left their mark. No one can find the strength to call her. What do we do in such times? Do we forget her? Do we forget that within us it remains alive? Then, 200 years ago, the flame of freedom was rekindled in the hearts and minds of the Greeks. Today, our narrator, a man who represents all the “branches” of the tree of democracy, travels from New York in 2021 (“With love from the soul, greets the country of Washington”), to Greece in 1821, to remember. To call her. To tell her story. Remember the sacrifices that must be made for freedom and democracy. But when the flame is lit, Freedom will not just let him tell its story. It will force him to live it. At a time in history when American democracy seems more fragile than ever in recent memory, at a time when democracies around the world are threatened by polarization, misinformation campaigns, and website hacking, Solomos’ “Hymn to Freedom” speaks today as clearly as when it was written. It recalls lessons that all democracies around the world must remember and put into practice. When it burns in the mind, the beating heart of freedom cannot be extinguished. The show contains live testimonies of Greek immigrants and expatriates living in New York and is presented in English and Greek.

(Edited and translated description from organiser’s website)