Books by Jose Saramago

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisNobel Prize-winner Jose Saramago's brilliant novel poses the question—what happens when the grim reaper decides there will be no more death? On the first day of the new year, no one dies. This of course causes consternation among politicians, religious leaders, morticians, and doctors. Among the general public, on the other hand, there is initially celebration—flags are hung out on balconies, people dance in the streets. They have achieved the great goal of humanity: eternal life. Then reality hits home—families are left to care for the permanently dying, life-insurance policies become meaningless, and funeral parlors are reduced to arranging burials for pet dogs, cats, hamsters, and parrots. Death sits in her chilly apartment, where she lives alone with scythe and filing cabinets, and contemplates her experiment: What if no one ever died again? What if she, death with a small d, became human and were to fall in love?

Read more less

Book SynopsisDespite the heavy rain, the officer at Polling Station 14 finds it odd that by midday on National Election day, only a handful of voters have turned out. Puzzlement swiftly escalates to shock when the final count reveals seventy per cent of the votes are blank. National law decrees the election should be repeated but the result is even worse. The authorities, seized with panic, decamp from the capital and declare a state of emergency. When apathy and disillusionment renders an entire democratic system useless what happens next?Trade ReviewHe writes with wit, with heartbreaking dignity, and with the simplicity of a great artist in full control of his art. Let us listen to a true elder of our people, a man of tears, a man of wisdom -- Ursula Le Guin * Guardian *A brilliant, cruelly ironic, surreal exposé of what we think of as civil society -- John Burnside * Scotland on Sunday *Saramago portrays an instantly recognisable world in which our political masters bang on about democracy while pursuing policies without any regard to the normal standards of law and basic morality, but in this dense, dark and occasionally brutal book he never forgets the satirist's duty to be funny -- Peter Parker * Sunday Times *This is political satire delivered with rare intellectual gravitas * Mail on Sunday *A profound fable * New Statesman *

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn an unnamed country, on the first day of the New Year, people stop dying. There is great celebration and people dance in the streets. They have achieved the great goal of humanity: eternal life. Soon, though, the residents begin to suffer. Undertakers face bankruptcy, the church is forced to reinvent its doctrine, and local 'maphia' smuggle those on the brink of death over the border where they can expire naturally.Death does return eventually, but with a new, courteous approach – delivering violet warning letters to her victims. But what can death do when a letter is unexpectedly returned?Trade ReviewIn the craft of the sentence, José Saramago is one of the great originals... no one writes quite like Saramago, so solicitous and yet so magnificently free. He works as though cradling a thing of magic * Guardian *Saramago has a light, graceful, ironic touch... the paraphernalia of magical realism -- John BanvilleThe author's eccentric voice is as engaging as ever... a fitting cap to a body of work as playful as it is wise * Financial Times *With characteristic dry wit he proceeds to debunk the rosy romance of eternal life * The Times *A compelling work by a fine writer ... the unique Saramagoan style ... gives the impression of a thought experiment to which the writer is merely a catalyst. That impression is a carefully crafted one: true art conceals its art, wrote Ovid * New Statesman *

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisJosé Saramago takes us on a thrilling literary journey through the land, history and culture of his native country.From the misty mountains of the north to the southern seascape of the Algarve, the travels of Nobel Laureate José Saramago are a passionate rediscovery of his own land. Embarking in the autumn of 1979, Saramago resolves to travel to Portugal, as well as through it. As his country emerges from an authoritarian dictatorship, he traverses his beloved homeland, neglecting its grand 'sights' in favour of Romanesque churches and cobweb-ridden chapels, determined to find belonging in the landscape which went on to inform his greatest works of fiction.Trade ReviewNo portico, farmhouse or ancient church is left undisturbed in Saramago's readable, if labyrinthine, tale of travelling across his homeland in 1979 -- Samuel Muston * Independent *None but a Portuguese could have written this book; none but Saramago could produce travel writing like this. It is a wholly appropriate tribute to that astonishing juncture where the sea ends and the land begins -- Henry Sheen * New Statesman *A book that...is a search for his country's heartbeat... The writing is, as always with Saramago, dense: a labyrinth of meaning and innuendo. But what is clear is that he loves Portugal. -- Simon Blow * Independent on Sunday *One feels privileged to be in his company... This book is a joy to pick up and a delight to read -- Hugh O'Shaughnessy * Tablet *

Read more less

Book SynopsisAfter killing his brother Abel, Cain must wander for ever. He witnesses Noah's ark, the destruction of the Tower of Babel, Moses and the golden calf. He is there in time to save Abraham from sacrificing Isaac when God's angel arrives late after a wing malfunction.Written in the last years of Saramago's life, Cain wittily tackles many of the moral and logical non sequiturs created by a wilful, authoritarian God, forming part of Saramago's long argument with God and recalling his provocative novel The Gospel According to Jesus Christ. Trade ReviewThere are some very funny moments in this reimagining of the story of Adam and Eve's fratricidal son... Hats must be doffed once again to Margaret Jull Costa, Saramago's fearless long-time translator, for taming his punctuation-free prose, rendering it not only readable, but enjoyable, and for bringing the late Portuguese author's often challenging work to a worldwide readership * Financial Times *José Saramago's final novel is an inventory of God's less noble moments...as flawed and wonderful a place to inhabit as the world his cosmic nemesis created * Sunday Herald *Every page of this novella, translated with a fluent and light touch by Margaret Jull Costa, has its charm. Every page raises difficult questions...as the final testament of Portuguese master, it is suitably disturbing and a pleasure to read * Scotsman *Saramago's breathless prose, expertly rendered into English by Margaret Jull Costa...conveys the sheer enjoyment of a writer bowing out at the top of his form * Sunday Times *Cain reminds us why Saramago's work remains vitally important * Metro *

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisEnsayo sobre la ceguera es la ficción de un autor que nos alerta sobre la responsabilidad de tener ojos cuando otros los perdieron.Dentro de nosotros hay algo que no tiene nombre, esa cosa es lo que somos.Un hombre parado ante un semáforo en rojo se queda ciego súbitamente. Es el primer caso de una ceguera blanca que se expande de manera fulminante. Internados en cuarentena o perdidos en la ciudad, los ciegos tendrán que enfrentarse con lo que existe de más primitivo en la naturaleza humana: la voluntad de sobrevivir a cualquier precio.Ensayo sobre la ceguera es la ficción de un autor que nos alerta sobre la responsabilidad de tener ojos cuando otros los perdieron. José Saramago traza en este libro una imagen aterradora y conmovedora de los tiempos que estamos viviendo. En un mundo así, cabrá alguna esperanza?El lector conocerá una experiencia imaginativa única. En un punto donde se cruzan literatura y sabiduría, José Saramago nos obliga a parar, cerrar

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisSaramago's Jesus is the son not of God but of Joseph. Mary Magdalene is his lover not his convert. In the wilderness he tussles not with the Devil – a kindly and necessary evil – but with God, a fallible, power-hungry autocrat. And he must die not for the sins of the fathers but for the sins of the Father. By investigating these simple inversions Saramago has woven a dark parable; a secular gospel of astonishing richness and depth.‘An original, wild and beautiful book’ Times Literary SupplementTrade ReviewProfound and poignant * Independent *An original, wild and beautiful book * Times Literary Supplement *

Read more less

Book SynopsisCipriano Algor, an ageing potter, lives with his daughter and her husband in the shadow of the Centre, a nebulous, constantly expanding conglomerate that provides his livelihood until it decrees that it is no longer interested in his humble wares. Together with his daughter, they craft a new line of small ceramic figurines and, to their bafflement, the Centre orders vast quantities. But once the figures are complete, the Centre recants: there is no market for them. Resigned to idleness Cipriano moves into the soulless megaplex, until late one night he comes across a horrifying secret in the bowels of the artificial city.Trade ReviewWhat distinguishes the book is the concern Saramago breathes over his characters; like potter's clay, they are patiently moulded into their best shape, retaining soft marks of memory -- David Jays * Guardian *A novel with impact... hope and charm * Independent *Saramago surprises us by bringing hos characters into close focus with his wise insights on the complexity of human relationships and the psychology of close family ties * Time Out *There are certain writers who will deliver something special with each new book, and Jos- Saramago is one of them * Sunday Telegraph *Saramago resolves the story with the same charm that characterises the whole book...he advocates a simpler life based on family and 'the small miracles of love'. He does so with humility, but also with implacable conviction -- Frank Egerton * The Times *

Read more less

Book SynopsisWatching a rented video, Tertuliano Maximo Afonso is shocked to notice that one of the actors is identical to him in every physical detail. Saramago's novel explores the nature of individuality and examines the fear and insecurity that arise when our singularity comes under threat, when even a wife cannot tell the original from the imposter...Trade ReviewQuite unlike anything else * London Review of Books *A Borgesian fable with a marvellous flavour all its own -- Phillip Hensher, Books of the Year * Spectator *A comic and profound exploration of the self... A uniquely seductive writer * Daily Telegraph *The Double is Saramago at his most practised and polished. It is philosophy and thriller rolled into one * Independent *Indebted to Borges and with a nod to Auster, he manages to surpass both with the audacity and sheer erudition of his prose -- Catherine Taylor * The Guardian *

Read more less

Book SynopsisJosé Saramago is one of the most important international writers of the last hundred years. Born in Portugal in 1922, he was in his sixties when he came to prominence as a writer with the publication of Baltasar and Blimunda. A huge body of work followed, translated into more than forty languages, and in 1998 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. Saramago died in June 2010.Trade ReviewThe voice of Small Memories is so immediate, genial and full of simple affection for the boy he was, that reading it feels very much like sharing a fireside with a talkative uncle * Guardian *A moving account of his childhood and adolescence...Small Memories will delight -- Raymond Carr * The Spectator *A real insight into the making of a great writer * Independent *It's impossible not to be charmed by this fluid, spontaneous-seeming memoir of boyhood from the late Portuguese Nobel Laureate, Jose Saramago [...] For all its delightful novelty, however, the childhood described here is also beguilingly universal: the superstitions and terrors, the mysteries and joys * Daily Mail *A powerful and nostalgic memoir * The Times *

Read more less

Book SynopsisJosé Saramago is one of the most important international writers of the last hundred years. Born in Portugal in 1922, he was in his sixties when he came to prominence as a writer with the publication of Baltasar and Blimunda. A huge body of work followed, translated into more than forty languages, and in 1998 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. Saramago died in June 2010.Trade ReviewExtraordinary...a tour de force of thought-experiment and feeling-experiment * Observer *This is a shattering work by a literary master...a book of real stature * Boston Globe *Saramago repeatedly undertakes to unite the pressing demands of the present with an unfolding vision of the future. This is his most apocalyptic, and most optimistic, version of that project yet. * Independent *He writes a prose of particularly luminous intensity, brilliantly rendered into English by his regular translator Giovanni Pontiero...Sweepingly ambitious * The Times *A powerful fable * Scotsman *

Read more less

Book SynopsisCalled the book lost and found in time' by its author, Skylight is one of Saramago's earliest novels. The manuscript was lost in the publishers' offices in Lisbon for decades, and is only now being published in English. Lisbon, late-1940s. The inhabitants of an old apartment block are struggling to make ends meet. There's the elderly shoemaker and his wife who take in a solitary young lodger; the woman who sells herself for money, clothes and jewellery; the cultivated family come down in the world, who live only for each other and for music; and the beautiful typist whose boss can't keep his eyes off her. Poisonous relationships, happy marriages, jealousy, gossip and love Skylight brings together all the joys and grief of ordinary people.Trade ReviewA fluid and imaginative translation by Margaret Jull Costa… A masterly creation: pessimistic without being bleak, lyrical without being sentimental… Saramago tears back that curtain to reveal not only the stage on which life is performed but also backstage, under unflattering working lights; to show humanity at its most anxious, its most vulnerable and most true -- James Runcie * Independent *For admirers of his work...the rescue of this novel from oblivion is something to be grateful for. The translator, Margaret Jull Costa, as ever, does a splendid job * Times Literary Supplement *Not only does it illuminate the slow development of a radically original artist, but it is an interesting novel in its own right -- Ursula Le Guin * The Guardian *This is one of Saramago’s early works but his eye for psychological nuance and his gift for sympathy are already in evidence * New Statesman *Skylight is a deeply affecting novel, the work of an already adroit writer who marshals his characters with assurance * Evening Standard *

Read more less

Book SynopsisA wry, fictional account of the life of Christ by the Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, Illuminated by ferocious wit, gentle passion, and poetry (Los Angeles Times Book Review). For José Saramago, the life of Jesus Christ and the story of his Passion were things of this earth: a child crying, a gust of wind, the caress of a woman half asleep, the bleat of a goat or the bark of a dog, a prayer uttered in the grayish morning light. The Holy Family reflects the real complexities of any family, but this is realism filled with vision, dream, and omen. Saramago's deft psychological portrait of a savior who is at once the Son of God and a young man of this earth is an expert interweaving of poetry and irony, spirituality and irreverence. The result is nothing less than a brilliant skeptic's wry inquest into the meaning of God and of human existence.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe Nobel Prize-winning author offers information about the history, culture, landscape, and people of his native Portugal, in an enchanting volume written by combining aspects of a novel, guidebook, and travelogue. Reprint. 20,000 first printing.

Read more less

Book SynopsisA story by Nobel Prize-winning author Jose Saramago, illustrated in woodcuts by one of Brazil's most famous authors.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisFor two years Solomon the elephant has lived in Lisbon. Now King Dom João III wishes to make him a wedding gift for a Hapsburg archduke in Vienna. The only way for Solomon to get to his new home is to walk. So begins a journey that will take the stalwart elephant across the dusty plains of Castile, over the sea to Genoa and up to northern Italy where, like Hannibal's elephants before him, he must cross the snowy Alps. Based on a true story, Saramago’s tale is an enchanting mix of fact, fable and fantasy.Trade ReviewIt is extremely funny. Old Saramago writes with a masterfully light hand, and the humour is tender, a mockery so tempered by patience and pity that the sting is gone though the wit remains vital... a series of contained miracles of absurdity, quiet laughter rising out of a profound, resigned, affectionate wisdom -- Ursula K Le Guin * Guardian *José Saramango wrote his final book with great panache -- Margaret Reynolds * The Times *Here is a book as serious as it is charming; amid its ironies runs a sustained pleas for the subversive workings of the imagination: "every elephant contains two elephants, one who learns what he's being taught and another who insists on ignoring it all". Thank goodness for that' * Guardian *A novel of wit, warmth and wonder -- Yann MartelHere he has seized the opportunity to turn an unlikely tale of a transalpine hike into something far larger even than its elephantine subject. -- Amanda Hopkinson * Independent *

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis deeply personal work, follows the changing fortunes of the Mau-Tempo family – poor, landless peasants not unlike the author’s own grandparents. Saramago charts the lives of the family in Alentjo, southern Portugal, as national and international events rumble on in the background – the coming of the republic in Portugal, the First and Second World Wars, and an attempt on the dictator Salazar's life. Yet, nothing seriously impinges on the farm labourers' lives until the first stirrings of communism.

Read more less

Lisbon, late-1940s. The inhabitants of an old apartment block are struggling to make ends meet. There’s the elderly shoemaker and his wife who take in a solitary young lodger; the woman who sells herself for money and jewellery; the cultivated family come down in the world; and the beautiful typist whose boss can’t keep his eyes off her.Poisonous relationships, happy marriages, jealousy, gossip and love – Skylight brings together the joys and grief of ordinary people. One of his earliest novels, it provides an entry into Saramago’s universe but was lost for decades and published, as per his wishes, after his death.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe world's threats are universal like the sun but Ricardo Reis takes shelter under his own shadow. Back in Lisbon after sixteen years practising medicine in Brazil, Ricardo Reis wanders the rain-sodden streets. He longs for the unattainably aristocratic Marcenda, but it is Lydia, the hotel chamber maid who makes and shares his bed. His old friend, the poet Fernando Pessoa, returns to see him, still wearing the suit he was buried in six weeks earlier. It is 1936, the clouds of Fascism are gathering ominously above them, so they talk; a wonderful, rambling discourse on art, truth, poetry, philosophy, destiny and love.Trade ReviewThe greatest of his novels * New Statesman *Lovely...a work of fluent and amazing gracefulness * Independent *A capacious, funny, threatening novel * New York Times Review of Books *He has created a body of work of luminous power: ironic, intellectually playful, dense and strange * Scotsman *Shows Saramago to be a novelist of the grandest sort...it is a dramatic work of great philosophical weight, filtered through a refined contemplative intelligence * Independent *

Read more less

Book Synopsis"A man went to knock at the king's door and said, Give me a boat. The king's house had many other doors, but this was the door for petitions. Since the king spent all his time sitting by the door for favours (favours being offered to the king, you understand), whenever he heard someone knocking on the door for petitions, he would pretend not to hear..." Why the petitioner required a boat, where he was bound for, and who volunteered to crew for him and what cargo it was found to be carrying the reader will discover as this short narrative unfolds. And at the end it will be clear that what night appear to be a children's fable is in fact a wry, witty Philosophical Tale that would not have displeased Voltaire or Swift.Trade ReviewSaramago writes possibly the most beautiful but certainly the most precise and differentiated Portuguese prose of our time -- Walter Haubrich * Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung *Saramago is a writer, like Faulkner, so confident of his resources and ultimate destination that he can bring any improbability to life -- John UpdikeNo candidate for a Nobel Prize has a better claim to lasting recognition than this novelist -- Edmund WhiteHe was the equal of Philip Roth, Günter Grass, Thomas Pynchon and Don DeLillo. His genius was remarkably versatile - he was at once a great comic and a writer of shocking earnestness and grim poignancy -- Harold BloomSaramago is a writer of formidable talent and extraordinary imagination * La Repubblica *

Read more less

Book SynopsisA subtle and insightful story about boredom, passion, curiosity and memory from the Nobel Prize-winner José SaramagoSenhor José is a lonely civil servant who spends his days labouring in the labyrinthine stacks of Lisbon's central registry. Among the file-cards for the living and the dead, one – of an apparently ordinary woman – will transform his life. Breaking away from his strict routine, José resolves to track the woman down, obsessively following a thread of clues in a bid to rescue her from an oblivion deeper than the grave. 'When a very good book finds us at just the right moment in life, it can become stitched into our own identity. All the Names – a novel about identity and connection – has become stitched into mine' Samantha Harvey, IndependentTrade ReviewA novel that has soul, which Saramago offers to his readers with all his witty, intelligent, tender and magical generosity -- Samantha Harvey * Independent *Offers an unearthly, muted beauty; a freedom from the obvious, the ideological and trivial; an atmosphere of profound serenity, and a benevolent humor * Literary Review *Both delightful and unsettling which is perhaps the mark of true literature -- Anthony Daniels * Sunday Telegraph *A tantalizing novel...shifting and teasing, full of metaphorical labyrinths and false trails * Herald *It is the marriage of the living and the dying...that so strongly characterizes the writing of Jose Saramago * New Statesman *

Read more less

Book SynopsisWhat if, one day, Europe was to crack along the length of the Pyrenees, separating Spain and Portugal from the rest of Europe?In Saramago's fable, a new island is sent spinning through the ocean like a great stone raft. While the authorities panic and tourists flee, three men, two women and a dog are drawn together by omens that burden them with a peculiar responsibility. In this magical realist tale, the six take to the road, finding themselves adrift in a world now unfamiliar and forced to reckon with their relationships, human psychology and the shakiness of belief itself.Trade ReviewAn irresistible blend of shrewd detail and lyrical fantasy... A seductive novel that needs to be savoured -- Helen Dunmore * Observer *An invitation to one of the richest bodies of work by a living writer -- Amanda Hopkinson * New Statesman *Jose Saramago's brilliant evocation...is magical realism of a sort that stirs real wonder -- James Park * Time Out *Saramago's lovely and original questing story, in a lineage of others such as Don Quixote and Kipling's Kim, is a journey of the spirit told as a journey of the feet -- Richard Eder * Los Angeles Times *Tremendous wit is always apparent in his imaginative conceits, comic digression and verbal and narrative games -- Ian Critchley * Sunday Times *

Read more less

Book SynopsisWhat happens when the facts of history are replaced by the mysteries of love?When Raimundo Silva, a lowly proofreader for a Lisbon publishing house, inserts a negative into a sentence of a historical text, he alters the whole course of the 1147 Siege of Lisbon. Fearing censure he is met instead with admiration: Dr Maria Sara, his voluptuous new editor, encourages him to pen his own alternative history. As his retelling draws on all his imaginative powers, Silva finds – to his nervous delight – that if the facts of the past can be rewritten as a romance then so can the details of his own dusty bachelor present.Trade ReviewMarvellous, seriously witty, erotic and edgily surreal -- Lucy Hughes-Hallett * Sunday Times *Saramago is one of Europe's most original and remarkable writers...his writing is imbued with the spirit of comic enquiry, meditative pessimism and a quietly transforming energy that turns the indefinite into the unforgettable -- Richard Eder * Los Angeles Times *This cryptic, ingenious novel...is never dull or humourless... No candidate for [the Nobel Prize] has a better claim to lasting recognition than this novelist who was born in 1922 but was in his mid-50s before he started to publish the fiction that has won him an international reputation -- Edmund White * New York Times *A book filled with lyrical and intellectual rewards -- Bill Marx * Boston Globe *This hypnotic tale is a great comic romp through history, language and the imagination * Publishers Weekly *

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less