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Graecophiles who knew the country 50 years ago must despair at the horrors
left by the unrelenting tide of tourism. In A Bottle in the Shade
(Sinclair-Stevenson, £17.99, ISBN 1 85619 588 0), poet and erstwhile
archaeologist Peter Levi takes the risk, wandering, aged but game, down the
byways of the Peloponnese. This idiosyncratic portrait of the western portion
takes in poets Nikos Gatsos and George Seferis, rambles among the evocative
hills and vignettes of dusty daily life in the provinces. The reader must,
however, consume a certain amount of stodge to get at the plums.