Panos Ioannides

Census Panos Ioannides

Publisher Marketing: Census, is the bold, heretic allegory of a contemporary nativity and at the same time an eloquent, cathartic retort to the satanic messages of the renowned horror film Rosemary's Baby, directed by Roman Polanski, which in fact served as the first stimulus for this award-winning novel. Set in the middle of the twentieth century in the mountainous Cypriot village of Spilia, denoting "Cave" in Greek, Census follows the pregnancy of cancer patient Maria, who conceives during her single intercourse with the angelically handsome young Michael, visiting from Patmos, the Aegean island of John's Revelation. The gestation culminates in the "nativity" at a Nicosia clinic, of a bodiless, unseen Christ. Though incorporeal, scentless and colourless, the mysterious life-giving force that is liberated explosively from Maria's womb, brings about premature efflorescence and a diffusion of aromas across the clinic's flower pots; and akin to healing energy, it begins curing the spiritual and psychosomatic ailments of all those it overshadows, urging the distinguished members of the island's medical community, present at the labour, to dedicate their life, scientific knowledge and abilities to studying and utilizing this unknown new energy. Boasting repeated editions in Greece and Cyprus, this award-winning novel by Panos Ioannides, replete with magical realism, is riveting in terms of conception and execution: a sacred metaphysical thriller that redeems and purifies the reader. A masterpiece in the art of fiction and the recipient of the Cyprus National Prize for Literature, 1973.