NP-Antunes--The Inquisitor's Manual

[joeallonby]

on 7/23/03 10:14 AM, Richard Romeo at romeocheeseburger at yahoo.com wrote:

> Hi all--
> 
> Quite enjoying The Inquisitor's Manual, newly
> translated from the Portguese--much like Absalom
> Absalom (dense and grim), mixed with Autumn of the
> Patriarch (dream-like, poetic and grim)
> a pretty fair indictment of the vileness of Portugal
> under the military dictatorship of Professor Salazar.
> It's a little easier to read since the paragraphs
> don't run together but are split like poems are
> 
> This is a consistent theme of much of Antune's works
> (an obsession with Portugal's colonial past) (and with
> birds)
> He's also noted for having a big feud with Portugal's
> more beloved Nobel Prize winner, Saramago
> Antunes also reminds me a wee bit of Thomas Bernhard
> but with a wider collection of obsessives within his
> books than Bernhard's (or Nabokov I suppose) lone
> narrators
> 
> highly recommend for those not liable to slit their
> wrists. vivid, compelling all those book review
> cliches
> 
> Rich

Some background.

<http://www.cphrc.org.uk/essays/article2.htm>