Original Title: Sostiene Pereira
Collection: foreign domain
Translator: Bernard How
Editions: 10/18
Year of Publication: 1998
Number of pages: 218 p.
Cover: Place du Palais Royal Lisbon (detail)
Comment: Lisbon. Summer 1938. While Portugal lived under the dictatorship of Salazar , that civil war brewing in Spain and that fascism rages in Italy, Pereira, was appointed director of the cultural page of the newspaper Lisboa. To assist in this task, this sad character who speaks in frail portrait of his late wife, called upon the services of Monteiro Rossi for his obituary section of which deals with the writers "to die". Suddenly overwhelmed by this encounter, life takes an unexpected turn Pereira: nothing happens as he wants but he lacks the strength to prevent her destiny fulfilled. He who was interested only translating French novels of the nineteenth century, tangled up in political intrigues in which he would not know. Stitches in Time, our reluctant hero, will learn at the expense of its tranquility, being a journalist in Portugal during the Salazar dictatorship, is not a chore. Obedient to some unknown force known it then discovers the power of journalists and assume his role until the end ...
I struggled to get into this story. The tone used by Tabucchi resonates as a kind of advocacy that I found quite indigestible. Throughout the novel, Tabucchi Pereira talks about his actions by introducing "says Pereira," and we do not really know where he is coming from. We discovered over the text a character at first any, even insignificant resigned yet. Nothing foreshadows the end of the story. And the author's note at the end of the book suddenly justifies the whole reason of this novel. You come out confused, touched, moved. If this really existed Pereira as the "claims" this novel Tabucchi, then I say: long live Pereira whatever name he has really paid. A novel and unexpected for me really a very nice discovery ...
Trivia: In 1995, the protagonist of the novel Pereira Declares, becomes a symbol for the left opposition to Berlusconi, the media magnate.
I struggled to get into this story. The tone used by Tabucchi resonates as a kind of advocacy that I found quite indigestible. Throughout the novel, Tabucchi Pereira talks about his actions by introducing "says Pereira," and we do not really know where he is coming from. We discovered over the text a character at first any, even insignificant resigned yet. Nothing foreshadows the end of the story. And the author's note at the end of the book suddenly justifies the whole reason of this novel. You come out confused, touched, moved. If this really existed Pereira as the "claims" this novel Tabucchi, then I say: long live Pereira whatever name he has really paid. A novel and unexpected for me really a very nice discovery ...
Trivia: In 1995, the protagonist of the novel Pereira Declares, becomes a symbol for the left opposition to Berlusconi, the media magnate.
Excerpts: " He said the philosophy gives the impression of caring only for truth, but perhaps does not say that she fancies, and literature gives the impression to look only fantasies, but maybe she said the truth. " p.33
" Yes, "said Pereira, but they were right, my life no sense, it would not make sense to have studied at Coimbra and letters have always believed that literature was the most important thing in the world, it would not make sense that I run the cultural page of this newspaper in the afternoon where I can not express my opinion and where I have to publish accounts of nineteenth-century French, nothing would meaning, and that's what I feel the need to repent, as if I was another person and not the Pereira has always been a journalist, as if I were to deny something. " p. 126
"It's easy objected Dr. Cardoso, anyway there are preventive censorship every day before leaving the testing of your newspaper pass through the imprimatur of preventive censorship and if there is something wrong, you can rest assured that it will not be published, maybe they will leave a blank space, it I already got to see Portuguese newspapers with large blank spaces, it inspires great rage and great sadness. " p. 132
" You are in conflict with you himself in this battle that stirs your soul, you should drop your superego, let him go to his destiny as trash. " p. 161
" Excuse me , sir, "said Pereira with compunction, but hey, I wanted to tell you one thing, originally we Lusitano, then we had the Romans, Celts, and then we had the Arabs, then what race we can celebrate, we Portuguese? " p. 190
" Yes, "said Pereira, but they were right, my life no sense, it would not make sense to have studied at Coimbra and letters have always believed that literature was the most important thing in the world, it would not make sense that I run the cultural page of this newspaper in the afternoon where I can not express my opinion and where I have to publish accounts of nineteenth-century French, nothing would meaning, and that's what I feel the need to repent, as if I was another person and not the Pereira has always been a journalist, as if I were to deny something. " p. 126
"It's easy objected Dr. Cardoso, anyway there are preventive censorship every day before leaving the testing of your newspaper pass through the imprimatur of preventive censorship and if there is something wrong, you can rest assured that it will not be published, maybe they will leave a blank space, it I already got to see Portuguese newspapers with large blank spaces, it inspires great rage and great sadness. " p. 132
" You are in conflict with you himself in this battle that stirs your soul, you should drop your superego, let him go to his destiny as trash. " p. 161
" Excuse me , sir, "said Pereira with compunction, but hey, I wanted to tell you one thing, originally we Lusitano, then we had the Romans, Celts, and then we had the Arabs, then what race we can celebrate, we Portuguese? " p. 190
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