Nikos Kazantzakis was a renowned Greek writer, journalist, politician, poet, and philosopher. He is widely considered a giant of modern Greek literature and was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in nine different years. Kazantzakis remains the most translated Greek author worldwide.

Kazantzakis's novels include Zorba the Greek (published in 1946 as Life and Times of Alexis Zorbas), Christ Recrucified (1948), Captain Michalis (1950, translated as Freedom or Death), and The Last Temptation of Christ (1955). In addition to novels, he wrote plays, travel books, memoirs, and philosophical essays, such as The Saviors of God: Spiritual Exercises. His fame spread in the English-speaking world due to cinematic adaptations of Zorba the Greek (1964) and The Last Temptation of Christ (1988).

He also translated notable works into Modern Greek, including The Divine Comedy, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, On the Origin of Species, and Homer's Iliad and Odyssey.