José Saramago
Portugal
1922-
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José Saramago is an accomplished Portuguese writer who
has distinguished himself as an author of fiction, poetry,
plays, and essays. Saramago is best known, both in his
native Portugal and among English-language readers, for
his novels. In 1998, Saramago was awarded the Nobel Prize
in Literature, the first Portuguese writer ever to receive
the award. The Swedish Academy cited Saramago for work
that "with parables sustained by imagination, compassion
and irony continually enables us to apprehend an illusory
reality." ... Saramago's "panoramic and sweeping
characterization of the Portuguese and peninsular existence
has struck a chord not only among his compatriots in Portugal,
but also in Spain and beyond," argued Irwin Stern
in the Encyclopedia of World Literature in the Twentieth
Century. "his fiction is not only a continual dialogue
with the Portuguese character and the nation's history
but also a revelation of basic human desires and fantasies."
(Contemporary Authors Online)
Click to read Saramago's Nobel
Lecture: "How Characters Became the Masters and
the Author Their Apprentice"
For more information check out the display in Burling
or visit his page in Literary
Resource Center online...
Related Authors:
Fernando Pessoa (1898-1935)
Gabriel Garcia Marquez (1928- )
