The volume collects the analytical, processed and documented form of the thirty-three presentations that were presented at the International Conference titled "The Poet and the Citizen Yiannis Ritsos", organized by the Benaki Museum, from September 28th to October 1st, 2005. The conference also included two "round tables", which focused on (a) the reception of Ritsos by contemporary poets and (b) the testimonies of people whose paths intersected with that of Yiannis Ritsos. The above title covered, in addition to the conference, an exhibition of documents from the poet's archive, which belongs to the Benaki Museum, and a series of artistic events (poetry readings and concert).

During the conference, distinguished Greek and foreign philologists, poets and translators, scholars of the poet's work, as well as modern Greek literature, confronted the multifaceted poetic creation of Ritsos, in the light of new reflections defined by the combination of scientific methodology and the new social - intellectual conditions of our time.

The central terms of the title (poet and citizen), as well as the thematic axes of the conference, which specified the organizers' quests and goals ("Yiannis Ritsos and the ancient Greek world", "Yiannis Ritsos and his era", "His poetry", "Yiannis Ritsos and the world"), gave the opportunity to the presenters to develop reflections that touched upon many levels and various aspects of Ritsos' poetic body, offering the fruits of a study that is now sealed and sanctioned by the distance of time. Within this framework, issues such as: the - already critical and significant for Greek creators - relationship of Ritsos with the ancient Greek world, the conceptualization, forms of reception and ways of handling myth, the concept of poetry, which was either formulated theoretically by the poet or emerges from the discourse of his work, the role of the poet and the notion of "mobilization", the reception of his work by his contemporaries and subsequent criticism, the earlier and current perception of his poetry beyond Greek borders, and comments on emerging translation problems, the possibilities and ways of reading his poetry today were analyzed.

The Proceedings of this Conference, the first major one dedicated exclusively to the study of his work, aims, according to its publishers, "to constitute a distinct corpus within the whole of the already extensive bibliography that has been formed in recent decades".

The presentations included are:
- Dimitris Maronitis, "The 'Philoctetes' of Yiannis Ritsos: faces and personae"
- Yiannis Dallas, "Aspects of the theme and poetry in the ancient-themed poems of Ritsos"
- Eirini Zamarou, "Ritsos reads the rhapsody S' of the Iliad"
- Michalis Pieris, "Yiannis Ritsos - Kostas Montis: the overturning of the mythical method"
- Giorgos Giatromanolakis, "Ritsos and Seferis facing the ancient world"
- Roderick Beaton, "Modernism and the search for national identity: the case of Yiannis Ritsos' 'Romeosini'"
- Mario Vitti, "The first turning point"
- Giorgos Kehayoglou, "The Cypriot dimension of Ritsos' poetry"
- Christos Alexiou, " ... "because time and the sun have the same age - our age: An attempt to analyze the "Fourth Dimension" of Yannis Ritsos"
- Athena Vogiatzoglou, "Yannis Ritsos, "Late, very late in the night" - Odysseas Elytis,
"The elegies of the acid rock": two intersecting "studies of death"
- Angeliki Kotti, "Alone with his work: a wandering in the poet's Archive"
- Vincenzo Rotolo, "The role of poetry and the poet in Yannis Ritsos"
- Michalis Meraklis, "His one and the other obsession of Yannis Ritsos"
- Christina Dounia, "Yannis Ritsos and his critics"
- Pantelis Boukalas, "The poems of Yannis Ritsos, their silence and their voice"
- Roula Kaklamanaki, "Memory and mnemotechnics in the work of Yannis Ritsos"
- Sonia Ilinskaia, "Ritsos's poetic manifestos over time"
- Elli Philokypros, "Acting and sincerity in the work of Ritsos"
- Alexandros Argyriou, "A little and expensive theoretical speech of Ritsos about poetry"
- Aris Maragopoulos, "Form as content in the work of Yannis Ritsos"
- Peter Bien, "A ritualistic view of Ritsos's 'The Moonlight Sonata'"
- Euripides Garantoudis, "Morphological observations in the first poetic books of Ritsos"
- Dimitris Kokoris, "Condensations of poetry and the poetry of Yannis Ritsos: Testimonies"
- Gina Kalogirou, "The narrative discourse and the logic of narration in 'Iconostasis of anonymous saints'"
- Eratosthenes Kapsomenos, "Tradition and innovation in the poetry and poetics of Yannis Ritsos"
- Chrysa Prokopaki, "'The apotheosis of the road': an early composition of Ritsos dedicated to Palamas"
- Xenia Maritski Gatzanski, "The Serbian reception of Yannis Ritsos"
- Gertrude Durusoy, "The translations and reception of Yannis Ritsos in Turkey"
- Eugenia Kritsefskaia, "The reception of Ritsos in Russia"
- David Ricks, "'These trees are not satisfied with less sky': problems in the translation of 'Romiosini'"
- Ivan Gadjanski, "Remembering Ritsos's dedication of a book"
- Amy Mims, "Ritsos of the 'Iconostasis' and Joyce of 'Ulysses'"