Vasso Kalamaras (nee Papayiannaki) was born in Athens, Greece and arrived in
Australia in 1950. She studied drama in Athens in 1960-1961. She has an
Associationship in Fine Arts from W.A.l.T. and holds a Dip.ED from Curtin
University.
For 22 years she was a lecturer in Modern Greek at C.M.C Tafe, Perth
Campus. Her husband Leonidas and their two sons Athanasios and Kostas are
all artists and lecturers of the Arts.
Vasso
writes plays, poetry, short stories and novels in English and Greek. Her
work has been widely published in Australian, Greek, American and Canadian
anthologies and translated into Chinese, French and i Italian. Her
English/Greek short story publications
include,
Other Earth Fremantle Arts Centre Press 1977, Bitterness Artlook
Books Perth 1982 and the play The Bread Trap Elilkia Books Melbourne
1986. An English publication of prose and poetry includes
The Same Light
Fremantle Arts Centre Press 1989 and Genesis Athina Publishers Melbourne
1993. The p ay Olympias, Mother of Alexander The Great Owl
Publishing, Melbourne 2001, was published in two volumes, English and Greek.
A number of her plays have been performed in English and Greek.
Karagiozis
Strikes it Rich was performed in Greek in Sydney and Canberra in 1987,
directed by Stavros Economides and Karagiozis Down Under was
performed in English, Perth in 1992, directed by John Saunders. This helped
make the popular Greek character known to the Australian audience.
Dame
Mary Durack and Vosso Kalamaras are the two founding members of PEN in
Perth. Vasso is also a member of
PEN Perth (International) and National Society of Hellenes Writers, Athens,
Greece.
Vasso
was awarded the Tsakalos Prize in Athens, 1978 for her novel
Impressions
of a journey and in Melbourne 1981 her play
The Bread Trap won
the Hellenic Festival Award. In Perth, Vasso received the 1992 Hellenism
Award. Her co lection of poetry and short prose The Same L'ghfwon the
1990 Western Australian Premier's Award for fiction. Vasso was one of many
women involved in tobacco farming in Manjimup from 1950 -1961.
