40+ Quotes about Greece to feed your wanderlust (with images)

Greece is always one of the most desired summer destinations for travelers. The magnificent landscape, the open sea, and the local life, all these elements are immortalized in the famous quotes about Greece that you’ll see below. The prospect of a long, lazy summer after a tough winter is always a reason for joy, and that’s why I thought of writing this article: to feed your wanderlust.

Each of these inspirational quotes about Greece, which you’ll read in this article, belongs to famous and less-famous people. You will see one-line quotes for Greece like the ones by Henry Miller, but you’ll also find longer, more descriptive ones by Kazantzakis and Patrick Leigh Fermor. The choice wasn’t easy. I wanted these quotes on Greece to highlight a specific element or portray what Greece is all about.

These quotes about Greece contain accuracy and exaggeration, but they also express love and admiration. Most are written by foreign travelers, but I included several quotes from Greeks about their country. So, if you want some inspiration for your upcoming journey to Greece or if you’re searching for Instagram captions for your Greek photos, you’re in the right place.

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Popular travel quotes about Greece: The voice of foreign travelers

The natural beauty of Greece, plus the simplicity of life, always attracted foreign travelers. Some of them wrote wonderful lines about the country. It’s not an exaggeration to say that every writer, artist, or philosopher traveled to Greece and observed things the locals often overlook. Here you can see what these people thought about the country. Some of their travel quotes about Greece remain still relevant -and legendary.

Greece is the home of Gods. They may have died, but their presence still makes itself felt. The gods were of human proportion: they were created out of the human spirit.

– Henry Miller

 

Greece – The feeling of being lost in time and geography with months and years hazily sparkling ahead in a prospect of inconjecturable magic.

– Patrick Leigh Fermor

I want to see the Parthenon by moonlight.

– Daphne Du Maurier

 

The world is expanding Greece and Greece is the shrinking world.

– Victor Hugo

 

The light of Greece opened my eyes, penetrated my pores, expanded my whole being.

– Henry Miller (The Colossus of Maroussi)

 

How can any educated person stay away from the Greeks? I have always been far more interested in them than in Science.

– Albert Einstein

 

Greece is a good place
To look at the moon, isn’t it
You can read by moonlight
You can read on the terrace
Υou can see a face
As you saw it when you were young

– Leonard Cohen (Days of Kindness)

Famous quotes about Greece: the voice of Greeks

Of course, Greek writers and poets have also traveled extensively around the country. Their descriptions have a more local touch, but they offer us some extremely accurate descriptions. To see a country through the locals’ eyes is always interesting. Greece’s Nobelist poets, Giorgos Seferis and Odysseus Elytis, together with Nikos Kazantzakis (writer of Zorba) and Cavafy, deserve definitely a mention. Here you can find some of their quotes about Greece.

One of the purest joys that man can afford in this world is to visit the Aegean Sea in the spring, with a breath of light breeze; I have never been able to imagine paradise in any other way. This joy grows right upside down, but God does not allow it to escalate so that the beloved visible world does not disappear with it, on the contrary, the invisible world becomes visible, and what we call God and eternal life and bliss join us on the ship and accompany us on the voyage. In the bitter hour of your death, close your eyes, and you will see Santorini, Naxos, Paros, Mykonos.

– Nikos Kazantzakis

 

Enthusiasm is a wonderful thing. In South America, they throw flowers at you. In Greece, Greeks throw themselves.

– Melina Mercouri

Wherever I travel, Greece hurts me.

– George Seferis

 

If a separate personal Paradise exists for each of us, mine must be irreparably planted with trees of words which the wind silvers like poplars, by people who see their confiscated justice given back, and by birds that even in the midst of truth of death insist on singing in Greek and saying eros, eros, eros.

― Odysseas Elytis

 

If you deconstruct Greece, you will, in the end, see an olive tree, a grapevine, and a boat remain. That is, with as much, you reconstruct her.

– Odysseas Elytis

Quotes about life in Greece

Greek culture and daily life are, of course, the cornerstone elements of society. The Greek way of living received praise from several authors and writers, and it’s fair to dedicate a section full of quotes about Greek life.

Among all peoples, the Greeks have dreamt life’s dream most beautifully.

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

 

We have exiled beauty; the Greeks took up arms for her.

―Albert Camus

 

I knew that no matter what door you knock on in a Cretan village, it will be opened for you. A meal will be served in your honor, and you will sleep between the best sheets in the house. In Crete, the stranger is still the unknown god. Before him, all doors and all hearts are opened.

– Nikos Kazantzakis

 

It takes a lifetime for someone to discover Greece, but it only takes an instant to fall in love with her.

– Henry Miller

 

Great suffering descended on Greece.
So many bodies thrown
into the jaws of the sea, the jaws of the earth… all for a linen undulation, a bit of cloud, a butterfly’s flicker, a swan’s down, an empty tunic —all for a Helen.

– Giorgos Seferis

 

I had begun to grasp, in the past few weeks, one of the great and uncovenanted delights of Greece; a pre-coming of age present in my case: a direct and immediate link, friendly and equal on either side, between human beings, something which melts barriers of hierarchy and background and money and, except for a few tribal and historic feuds, politics and nationality as well… Existence, these glances say, is a torment, an enemy, an adventure and a joke which we are in league to undergo, outwit, exploit and enjoy on equal terms as accomplices, fellow-hedonists, and fellow-victims.

― Patrick Leigh Fermor

 

We must not forget that in the long twenty-five centuries there has not been one that poetry was not written in the Greek language.

― Odysseus Elytis

 

“Greece is like a mirror. It makes you suffer. Then you learn.’
To live alone?’
To live. With what you are.”

― John Fowles (The Magus)

The best quotes about the Greek islands

The Greek islands attract millions of tourists per year. Therefore, it’s only fair to include a separate section of quotes about the Greek islands. Here you will find a mixture of both Greek and international artists and travelers talking about the islands.

There is a kind of flame in Crete – let us call it ‘soul’ – something more powerful than either life or death. There is pride, obstinacy, valor, and together with these something else inexpressible and imponderable, something which makes you rejoice that you are a human being, and at the same time tremble.

– Nikos Kazantzakis

 

Unless you have seen the houses in Mykonos, you can’t pretend to be an architect. Whatever architecture has to say, it is said here.

– Le Corbusier

 

The isles of Greece, the isles of Greece! Where burning Sappho loved and sung, Where grew the arts of war and peace, Where Delos rose, and Phoebus sprung! Eternal summer gilds them yet, But all, except their sun, is set.

– Lord Byron

 

As you set out for Ithaca, hope your road is a long one, full of adventure, full of discovery.

– Konstantinos Kavafis

 

The only sounds: – when ‘gan the West to burn, and the red sun upon the seas to ride, I stood upon the soil of Greece at last!

– Oscar Wilde

 

Happy is the man, I thought, who, before dying, has the good fortune to sail the Aegean sea.

– Nikos Kazantzakis

My childhood in Corfu shaped my life. If I had the craft of Merlin, I would give every child the gift of my childhood.

― Gerald Durrell, (My Family and Other Animals)

Famous Quotes about Athens, Greece

Athens is one of the most legendary cities of antiquity. A fair part of our knowledge about Ancient Greece and ancient Greeks comes from Athens. Nowadays, Athens is a buzzing metropolis of almost four million inhabitants. Nevertheless, contemporary Athens still attracts plenty of visitors due to the combination of ancient and modern history.

Of the many smells of Athens two seem to be the most characteristic – that of garlic, bold and deadly like acetylene gas. And that of dust, soft and warm and caressing like tweed.

– Evelyn Waugh

The Parthenon is really only a farmyard over which someone put a roof; colonnades and sculptures were added because there were people in Athens who happened to be working and wanted to express themselves.

– Pablo Picasso

 

If Athens shall appear great to you, consider then that her glories were purchased by valiant men, and by men who learned their duty.

– Pericles

I am a citizen, not of Athens, or Greece, but of the world.

– Socrates

 

Earth proudly wears the Parthenon as the best gem upon her zone.

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

 

Athens, the eye of Greece, mother of arts and eloquence.

– John Milton

 

How great are the dangers I face to win a good name in Athens?

– Alexander the Great

Quotes about the Greeks & the Greek landscape

Last but definitely not least, here’s one section that couldn’t be missing. Here you will find quotes about the Greeks and the country’s landscape. Writers and philosophers extensively explored the Greeks’ connection to their land, and here’s what they thought about it.

For the Greeks, values existed a priori and marked out the exact limits of every action. Modern philosophy places its values at the completion of action.

― Albert Camus

 

Whatever, in fact, is modern in our life we owe to the Greeks. Whatever is an anachronism is due to mediaevalism.

― Oscar Wilde

 

There is more of Mozart here than anywhere in the world. The road to Epidaurus is like the road to creation. One stops searching. One grows silent, stilled by the hush of mysterious beginnings. If one could speak one would become melodious.

–Henry Miller (The Colossus of Maroussi)

 

The Laconian peninsula lay weightlessly along the eastern horizon and, slightly more substantial, the outline of Elaphonisi—Stag-Island—loomed between us. Wraithlike on the Lybian Sea which expanded southwards far beyond the divider-point capes of Malea and Matapan, hovered Cythera once again, and beyond it, hardly discernible, Anticythera, the last stepping stone to the two stormy western capes of Crete.

― Patrick Leigh Fermor (Mani)

 

The Greeks invented trigonometry. They did autopsies and dissections. What could you tell an ancient Greek that he couldn’t say, ‘Big Deal.’ Could you tell him about the atom? Atom is a Greek word. The Greeks knew that the major events in the universe can’t be seen by the eye of man.

– Don Delillo (White Noise)

The Greeks had invented democracy, built the Acropolis, and called it a day.

– David Sedaris

 

The Greeks made Space the subject-matter of a science of supreme simplicity and certainty. Out of it grew, in the mind of classical antiquity, the idea of pure science.

– Hermann Weyl

Bonus: Greek Guides & Summer Essentials

If you made it to the end of this list of 40+ Greece quotes, I guess you’re ready for a Greek vacation. I wrote extensively about Greece in this travel blog, so I’d like to share some of my resources to help you plan your trip.

• How to visit the Greek islands on a budget. In this comprehensive article, you’ll find tips and info on how to spend three weeks island hopping in the Greek islands for less than 1,000 euros. Check out the Greek islands guide here.
• One week in Greece itineraries. That’s probably the most thorough article you’ll find online about a one-week vacation in Greece. Perfect for culture lovers and for people willing to have an easy-going holiday, but also for nature lovers. Find out the perfect one-week itinerary for you here.
• The best day trips from Athens. If you’re spending a couple of days in Athens, make sure to take one (or more) day trips out of the city. A combination of impressive landscapes, endless sea views, and tales of antiquity awaits you two hours away from the Greek capital. So, see here the best day trips from Athens.
• More Greece wanderlust. There’s a dedicated category about Greece with loads of articles. There you’ll find remote islands, photo reports, polaroids, and guides to antiquity spots. Check the Greece category here.

Last but not least, if you visit Greece during summer, don’t forget these three items:

1. Sunscreen. The heat is intense, and you don’t want to travel without one.
2. Pop-up tent. Most of the islands -especially in the Cyclades- have no natural shade. So get a pop-up tent that fits in your suitcase and be covered.
3. Mosquito Repellent. Depending on the area you’re visiting, there’s a chance that you might face problems with mosquitos. No worries, you won’t be in danger, but it can be annoying.

So, I hope you enjoyed the travel quotes about Greece. Let me know in the comments if you have already visited Greece or if you’re about to.

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Last Updated on April 12, 2024 by George Pavlopoulos