“We Are and We Remain Greeks”. The Radically Patriotic Discourse in Pyrsos Magazine, GDR, 1961–1968

This chapter explores the ways in which Pyrsos (Torch) magazine juxtaposed ambiguous and fragmentary images and texts concerning the Aegean landscape in its attempt to reclaim, perform and construct a left patriotic discourse. The study of Pyrsos is situated amongst the politics, culture and everyday life of the 1960s, and is marked by the intense antagonism between Cold War ideologies. Within this climate, and following Khrushchev’s 'peaceful coexistence', the outlawed Communist Party of Greece (Kommounistiko Komma Elladas, KKE) began to prepare the ground for its legalisation and to propagate the repatriation of the Greek political refugees who had been living in exile across the socialist states of Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. Pyrsos was an illustrated magazine, published between 1961 and 1968 in the German Democratic Republic (GDR). It was established by the KKE and was predominantly financed by the International Relations Department of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands, SED) . Its editorial policy and art direction, which for the most part reflected the aims of the KKE, were largely targeted at young refugees in the socialist states. Pyrsos played an important role in the formation of the patriotic discourse amongst the exiled Communist Left. The significance of the formation and circulation of left-patriotic rhetoric, particularly amongst the youth in the socialist states, has so far been under-researched, a lacuna that this chapter intends to fill.

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