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Paschalis M. Kitromilides, Insular Destinies: Perspectives on the History and Politics of Modern Cyprus

Antigone Heraclidou
p. 596-598
Référence(s) :

Paschalis M. Kitromilides, Insular Destinies: Perspectives on the History and Politics of Modern Cyprus, British School at Athens – Modern Greek and Byzantine Studies. Routledge, New York, 2019. xvi+224 pp. – ISBN 9780815356608.

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1Paschalis Kitromilides’s book is one of the latest additions to the very prominent series of Modern Greek and Byzantine Studies, a collaboration between the British School of Athens and Routledge Publications. The series, although new, has already shown a good record of studies by early career and established academics. Insular Identities is of added value for this collection due to its preoccupation with the social and political history of an island which has for centuries been part of the Greek world and, unavoidably, of Greek Irredentism.

2Insular Destinies’ significance lies in its dual nature: firstly, it can easily be used as a reference book, since the collection of essays cover a great time span, from 7000 BC until the tragic events of 1974. Secondly, it is a personal and self-retrospective book. By putting together a series of studies written in more than 30 years’ timeframe, Kitromilides shows a personal and lifelong scholastic commitment with intellectual history and more specifically the Enlightenment as the central expression of European modernity and the matrix of the modern idea of liberty (p. 8), as well as with ‘modern Cyprus evolution’ against the backdrop of the island’s travails (quoting Robert Holland, p. xi). Kitromilides’ Greek upbringing, in conjunction with his intellectual history studies and life as a Cypriot expatriate have let him to a self-awareness – as Holland points out in his forward – that is apparent and prominent in the essays of this book, – especially in Part II – making this collection both interesting and still relevant despite the fact that the essays were written years ago.

3The book is divided into three parts: “Part One: Culture and society on a captive island”; “Part Two: The politics of the Cyprus question”; and “Part Three: Bibliographical and critical notes”. In the context of this review, it would be difficult to comment upon all the essays, but we will stand on the most indicative examples of each part.

4Part One includes eight chapters, the seven of which are focused on the intellectual and social history of early modern Cyprus, while the eighth, is a concise yet comprehensive overview account of the history of the island from the prehistoric times in 7000 BC until the island’s independence in 1960. Essays in this part can be studied under the more general umbrella of Cyprus’s intellectual and political history. And yet, between them, they cover different themes and offer various perspectives which can satisfy the intellectual needs of a versatile audience. Some chapters cover wider time periods (for example Chapters 1 and 2) something that could be of interest to researchers not familiar with the history of this part of the world; to get acquainted with key events and internal dynamics that have shaped the history of Cyprus and impacted on the Cyprus Question. Other chapters deal with relatively known events to historians of Cyprus yet studied from a different perspective or analysed in a wider context. For example, in Chapter 4 the uprising of 1764 is perceived, not merely as an isolated incident, but as an episode that reflects the dynamics of social protest in traditional society. Similarly, in Chapter 5, the author uses the case of Dragoman Christophakis Constantinou to bring out social inequality. Inspired by a wall painting of the donors of the church of Arpera which depicts the Dragoman Christophakis Constantinou and his family, Kitromilides stresses out the absence of any mention of the dragoman’s wife on it despite her being a member of one of the most distinguished families of 18th century Cyprus and the courage, determination and skilfulness she showed after the death of her husband when called to raise her many children and take over the management of her late husband’s businesses. This, as Kitromilides eloquently expressed, “primarily reveals to us the structures of inequality that were deeply ingrained in the mentality of the time and required, by means of a powerfully symbolic anonymity, the submission and disappearance of the woman’s personality and her transformation, even in terms of appellation, into merely a complement of the man” (p. 71). Indeed, the absence of women in the political, economic, and social history of Cyprus, the Near East or the south-eastern Balkans is often striking, and this essay accentuates the need for further study on the role women played in shaping their country’s history.

5In general, essays included in Part One, deal with significant incidents, personalities and ideas that have shaped a captive island’s culture and society, as aptly said by the title of this part and can still become sources of inspiration for further research. For example, Kitromilides’ lost renaissance, as analysed in Chapter 2, and how this was developed in a geographical space outside Cyprus, both towards the East and the West, offers a cue for the study of the role of diaspora beyond the end of the Ottoman rule and the extend to which it contributed to the development of modernity in Cyprus during the British rule.

6Part Two (Chapters 9‑14) is preoccupied with the politics of the Cyprus Question and the ever-lasting ethnic conflict – although non militant for many years –, which has been tormenting Cyprus for decades. For example, Chapter 9 examines how domestic developments and international pressures gradually transformed a remarkably sound ethnic coexistence in Cypriot traditional society into ethnic differentiation and, eventually, communal conflict. Building on this, Chapter 10 stresses the inadequacies and shortcomings of the 1960 Cyprus Constitution. It is in fact, striking, that sixty years after the establishment of the Cyprus Republic, decision makers and politicians fail to see when refereeing to the Cyprus Constitution, what Kitromilides (and T. Kouloumbis) stressed out in an 1975 essay, that “the institutionalization of ethnic dualism [..] in the Cyprus constitution and the consequent political climate of communal divisiveness effectively blocked any policy initiatives which might have exploited the potentialities of social change in the direction of some form of integrative evolution rather than foster conflict” (p. 152).

7Part Two ends with a brief chapter on the milestones in the historiography of the Cyprus Question which can be of much interest to students and researchers, without of course excluding more recent publications on the history of Cyprus which have shed light on unknown or understudied themes and phenomena.

8Lastly, Part Three consists of biographical comments for all the studies included in the book and as such, it offers an insight to the essays and shows their perennial contribution to literature, as well as an incentive for further study, as was pointed out by Kitromilides himself in the Introduction.

9Paschalis Kintromilides’s Insular Destinies as a “persuasive account of a liberal, secular, modern Cypriot mind” – as Robert Holland points out in his Foreword – makes a valuable addition to the study of the history and politics of Modern Cyprus, and brings back to surface themes and perspectives on which we can reflect or study further.

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Antigone Heraclidou, « Paschalis M. Kitromilides, Insular Destinies: Perspectives on the History and Politics of Modern Cyprus »Cahiers du Centre d’Études Chypriotes, 50 | 2020, 596-598.

Référence électronique

Antigone Heraclidou, « Paschalis M. Kitromilides, Insular Destinies: Perspectives on the History and Politics of Modern Cyprus »Cahiers du Centre d’Études Chypriotes [En ligne], 50 | 2020, mis en ligne le 01 mai 2022, consulté le 17 mai 2025. URL : http://journals.openedition.org/cchyp/573 ; DOI : https://doi.org/10.4000/cchyp.573

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