The Greeks Have a Word For It is the second novel by Booker Prize-winning author Barry Unsworth

Barry Unsworth

Barry Unsworth is a British novelist who is known for novels with historical themes. He has published 15 novels, and has been shortlisted for the Booker Prize three times, winning once for the 1992 novel Sacred Hunger....

 published by Hutchinson

Hutchinson (publisher)

Hutchinson & Co. was an English book publisher, founded in 1887. The company merged with Century Publishing in 1985 to form Century Hutchinson, and was folded into the British Random House Group in 1989, where it remains as an imprint in the Cornerstone Publishing division...

 in 1967. It has since been republished by Weidenfeld & Nicolson

Weidenfeld & Nicolson

Weidenfeld & Nicolson Ltd is a British publisher of fiction and reference books. It is a division of the Orion Publishing Group.-History:...

 in 1993 and W. W. Norton & Company in 2002. It has been praised for its 'utterly convincing characterizations'.

Background

It is set in Athens

Athens

Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...

 in the aftermath of the Greek Civil War

Greek Civil War

The Greek Civil War was fought from 1946 to 1949 between the Greek governmental army, backed by the United Kingdom and United States, and the Democratic Army of Greece , the military branch of the Greek Communist Party , backed by Bulgaria, Yugoslavia and Albania...

 and draws on the author's own experiences teaching English as a foreign language, satirizing many members of the British Council

British Council

The British Council is a United Kingdom-based organisation specialising in international educational and cultural opportunities. It is registered as a charity both in England and Wales, and in Scotland...

in Athens.

Plot introduction

Two men arrive in Athens on the same boat. Kennedy an Englishman intends to make a living teaching English and devises a scam to make money fast. Mitsos is returning to Greece after many years away but finds it impossible to escape the memories of the brutal deaths of his parents at the hands of fellow Greeks during the war and an opportunity arises to take revenge. The two men meet briefly as they disembark the boat but their stories then diverge only to come together at the end of the book with fatal results.