Commemorating Rupert Brooke (1887-1915)

On April 23 2015 the poet Rupert Brooke died aboard a French hospital ship moored off the island of Skyros, in Tris Boukes Bay. His friends and fellow officers buried him in a nearby olive grove where in later years a tomb was placed on the spot of the original, provisional grave. Brooke is also remembered on Skyros by a monument on the square near the Archeological Museum and the Faltaits Museum, now called Platia Brooke.

On April 23, 2015 a Rupert Brooke Centenary Commemoration was held by his grave, led by the reverend canon Malcolm Bradshaw, at which I had the honour to be present as a poet from the Netherlands. During the ceremony the British ambassador to Greece held a short address. A guard of honour was provided by the Hellenic Airforce. Wreaths were laid by the British ambassador, the governor of Central Greece, the mayor of Skyros, the commanders of the Hellenic Airforce and Hellenic Navy on Skyros, the American military attache in Greece and representatives of various literary and cultural organisations, like the Rupert Brooke Society.

In the evening an exhibition on Rupert Brooke, called Rupert Brooke on Skyros: and Aegean corner of a foreign field was opened by the British ambassador and the mayor of Skyros. It will run until September 1 in the building of the primary school in Skyros-town.

The photographs I took give an impression of the moving and worthy commemoration of the great poet Rupert Brooke.