48 pages • 1 hour read
Nikos KazantzakisZorba the Greek
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1946A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 10-12Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 10 Summary
The narrator is copying a Buddhist song while trying not to think about the widow. Copying it helps the narrator, who has “routed [his] temptation” (122). He wishes to banish the widow from his thoughts to obtain transcendence. Meanwhile, Zorba disapproves and tries to convince the narrator. The narrator justifies himself by telling Zorba he is a different type of man. They go to church on Christmas Eve. The narrator considers the importance of eating, saying the stomach is “the firm foundation” (125). Zorba asks the narrator if he believes the nativity tale, and the narrator answers noncommittally. They go to a feast at Hortense’s, where in their happiness both the narrator and Zorba feel drawn to her. Zorba gives an impassioned speech to her, spending the night while the narrator returns home happily, feeling both part of and apart from mundane matters.
The narrator feels the days pass as the New Year approaches. Zorba goes to the church to represent the company, the narrator’s business venture, but also mentions possibly seeing the widow there. The narrator goes to the beach and remembers a poignant memory of helping a butterfly out of its cocoon only to see it die, an event that taught him that “one’s duty is to confidently to follow nature’s everlasting rhythm” (121).
Chapter 11 Summary
The narrator encounters the widow and feels tempted to respond, but does not and feels troubled. Nature consoles him and he feels “relieved” at the sight of a flowering almond tree (132). He encounters Zorba, who tells him that he has seen the widow. Both go to Hortense’s. Zorba has painted a picture of her holding four strings attached to battleships, representing the four admirals who she had flings with. Hortense feels melancholy about the passage of time and says she won’t eat. Zorba consoles her and urges her to do so. He mentions a theory about the return of youth and the existence of a doctor with an elixir to accomplish that. Hortense remembers her time at various places. Zorba is annoyed by the cats making noise on the roof. He goes to shoo them, but when he returns, Hortense is asleep. Zorba blames God for women being temptresses. At their lodgings, the narrator ponders how well Zorba fits with the mundane. He watches Zorba try to make a model of the cable railway, only to destroy it when it doesn’t work.
Chapter 12 Summary
The narrator wakes the next day and tries to read poetry, but he finds it unengaging. He aspires to become the “last man” (142) who has “orphaned himself from every faith and delusion” (142). The narrator writes to purge himself and achieve this state, which he calls “the Buddha.”
In the previous days when Zorba had returned from work, the narrator told him they needed to make progress because their funds were running low. That evening Zorba claims he’s found the right angle for the slope. He needs to go into Iraklio to gather the materials, which will take several days. The narrator and Hortense see Zorba off. Hortense asks Zorba not to forget her, while the narrator tells Zorba his trip is to take three days.
The narrator goes to the mountains later but is stopped by the postman, who delivers a letter from Karayannis, an old acquaintance (a fellow student) from Crete, a former monk and teacher, who now lives in Africa, where he opened a rope factory and found success. In contrast to Stavridaki, Karayannis speaks disrespectfully of Greeks, of only drawing pleasure from work, and of the colonial situation. In his letter, he invites the narrator to visit him in Africa. He also tells the narrator about raising a half-African daughter after casting her mother out for infidelity.
The narrator also receives a letter from his dear friend relating his efforts to save the Greeks from the Caucasus region. The friend affirms that he loves the narrator and reminds him of the promise they made to think of each other deeply should they feel a premonition that the other is in mortal danger.
Chapters 10-12 Analysis
The narrator and Zorba find themselves at odds with their respective love interests. The narrator continues to struggle with his attraction to the widow, to the point where literature becomes unengaging. He finds more solace in nature than in his readings. The poems that he used to enjoy no longer satisfy him, which signals a slight break from his intellectual tendencies. When Zorba insists that he see the widow, the narrator argues that he must follow his nature. He realizes that it is not so much about denying his attraction as it is waiting for the proper time, one that nature decides.
Meanwhile, there is tension between Zorba and Hortense when they visit her for the new year. Zorba brings her a drawing and consoles her as she grieves passage of time and her lost youth. In her drunk melancholy, Hortense talks about past lovers and falls asleep, thwarting Zorba’s desire to spend the night with her.
The narrator receives two letters after Zorba leaves to buy the materials needed for the cable railway. These letters exemplify the contrast in how two of the narrator’s friends, both intellectuals, view Greek identity and the clash between action motivated by self-interest and action motivated by duty. One acquaintance works for the pleasure of it without feeling a sense of national belonging; the other is currently fighting for his fellow Greeks in the Caucasus out of patriotic duty.
