He was born in Monemvasia and his childhood was marked by dramatic family conditions, bankruptcy, illness, deaths, which were probably the reason for his love of everyday life and his penetrative vision for love. In 1936, he witnessed the attack of tobacco workers by the police and, deeply moved, he composed the "Epitafios", a poem of a mother lamenting over her son's dead body. During the German occupation, he took part in the resistance, and during the civil war he was exiled for his left-wing ideas. In 1945, he wrote "Romiosini", a poem that celebrates the idea of resistance since the Byzantine times.

His work reflects a unique way of experiencing the world, even in its most mundane manifestations. He is a realist but through the filter of personal sympathy and certainly, not through detached objectivity. This filter is comprised of two things: love and observation. Ritsos defends individual dignity and he does not differentiate himself from the rest of the world; he searches for the common fate. Through this, one detects a positive approach to life, love, freedom, solitude, solidarity and action.
In 1977, he received the Lenin Prize for his poetry.