Project Description
Portugal’s third most translated authorGonçalo M. Tavares
Portugal
Gonçalo M. Tavares was born in Luanda in 1970 and teaches Theory of Science in Lisbon. Nobel Laureate José Saramago stated: »In thirty years’ time, if not before, Tavares will win the Nobel Prize, and I’m sure my prediction will come true… Tavares has no right to be writing so well at the age of 35. One feels like punching him.«Tavares has surprised his readers with the variety of books he has published since 2001 and has been awarded an impressive amount of national and international literary prizes in a very short time. In 2005 he won the José Saramago Prize for young writers under 35. In his speech at the award ceremony, Saramago commented: JERUSALÉM is a great book, and truly deserves a place among the great works of Western literature. JERUSALÉM was also awarded the Prêmio Portugal Telecom de Literatura em Língua Portuguesa 2007 and the LER/Millenium Prize. His novel LEARNING TO PRAY IN THE AGE OF TECHNOLOGY has received the prestigious Prize of the Best Foreign Book 2010 in France. This award has so far been given to authors like Salman Rushdie, Elias Canetti, Robert Musil, Orhan Pamuk, John Updike, Philip Roth, Gabriel García Márquez and Colm Tóibín. LEARNING TO PRAY was also shortlisted for the renowned French literary awards Femina Étranger Prize and Médicis Prize and won the Special Price of the Jury of the Grand Prix Littéraire du Web Cultura 2010. In 2011, Tavares received the renowned Grande Prêmio da Associação Portuguesa de Escritores, as well as the prestigious Prémio Literário Fernando Namora 2011. The author was also nominated for the renowned Dutch Europese Literatuurprijs 2013 and was on the Longlist of the Best Translated Book Award Fiction 2013. He was also nominated for the International IMPAC Dublin award 2013 and, most recently, for the Prix Jean-Monnet de Littérature Européenne 2015. MATTEO LOST HIS JOB is among the five shortlisted authors for the prestigious Prix Femina 2016 foreign fiction. According to the Portuguese Book Institute DGLAB, Gonçalo M. Tavares is the third most translated Portuguese author, after Fernando Pessoa and Eça de Queiroz, with 226 publications worldwide.
For further information, please also visit the author’s blog: > goncalomtavares.blogspot.com
Gonçalo M. Tavares’ rights have been sold in 70 countries.
© Joana Caiano//
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Short Notes on the Orient
Bashô tells a short story of his many journeys. He is leaving for the city of Maruoka and his great friend, Hokushi, who is from Kanazawa, thought he would only accompany him for a short distance – “but ended up travelling all the way to Maruoka, unable to say goodbye”. So we have a friend who endlessly says goodbye to the other, travelling all the way on a journey that is not his own. And then I imagine the continuation of this story. Now it would be Bashô’s friend Hokushi who would have to leave for his home, and Bashô would go with him, just a few metres, just to say goodbye, but he wouldn’t be able to let go of him and would go with him all the way back to Kanazawa. Imagine a farewell like this, uninterrupted, between two humans. Two humans who could spend a lifetime saying goodbye to each other like this, with such ceremony and delicacy.
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Dictionary of Artists
This Dictionary of Artists (“Dicionário de Artistas”), this Museum, starts from a detail, a tiny fragment, or the very central core of an artist’s work, and from there the text moves somewhere else. In the way that an animal that is hungry leaves its nest to go to a place where it senses food, thus the text starts its journey. But there is nothing didactic or explanatory about it, the texts in this Dictionary are autonomous beings that go out into the streets free and completely alone after midnight.
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The Middle Bone
The Middle Bone (“O Osso do Meio”) forms part of the universe of The Kingdom (“O Reino”), next in the series following Klaus Klump: A Man (“Um homem: Klaus Klump“), Joseph Walser’s Machine (“A Máquina de Joseph Walser”), Jerusalem, and Learning to Pray in the Age of Technology (“Aprender a rezar na Era da Técnica”). Perhaps a tone, books with tones (colours, aggression, speed) rather than literary genres. A tone such as this: how does evil, excitement, passivity and violence flow through the many soils of the earth? Taking place in a post-war period, in a movement of collective hangover. It is a book where the middle is there, right at the beginning, and there it remains until the end. Three men and a woman caught up in a point of their violent, (almost) happy lives. Happiness has many variations and some are not at all benign. Kahnnak, Albert Mulder, Maria Llurbai, Vassliss Rania: three men and a woman. A harsh and sad book.
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Plague Diary
Tavares has been writing a daily column for the renowned Portuguese newspaper Expresso tracking the COVID-19 pandemic, entitled Plague Diary (“Diário da Peste”). The first entry in Englishtranslation by Daniel Hahn went online at Words Without Borders. Several texts have been published at: Granta, Bookanista, PEN Transmissions, Asymptote, Politics/Letters, Onomatomania, The Massachusetts Reviews, Scroll, The White Review, and TLS. A chronological survey and access to the English translations can be found here: > danielhahn.co.uk. Plague Diary is also available in Argentina, Bulgaria, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Greece, India, Italy, The Netherlands, Peru, and Venezuela.
First book rights have been sold in Greece, Spain and for Romanian language.
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In America, Said Jonathan
In America, Said Jonathan (“Na América, Disse Jonathan”) is a book that relates a trip through the United States of America. During this trip, the protagonist writes a diary that follows his real and imaginary adventures. It is a ctional diary. The author brings a portrait of Kafka to the United States of America and puts it in various places throughout the country, including the supermarket shelves of 7-Eleven convenience stores. Kafka’s portrait seems to disturb a country the size of the United States of America. As if Kafka‘s face were asking uncomfortable questions of this great country.
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Mythologies
Mythologies (“Mitologias”), is one of the most important literary universes of Gonçalo M. Tavares. This world – which is now beginning to be published – blends men, machines, animals, and objects in a 21st Century mythology that can be read in any order of entry. It is a return to the traditional Once Upon a Time format set in a mythical time, which mixes dates and exchanges narrative orders in a space without geographic location. There is a suspension of normal physical laws, a different logic, other narrative conventions, in a zone of freedom that deals with evil, human temptations and their disorders and fears. Five children go through this world and just want what everyone wants: to survive as they grow.
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The Devil
The Devil (“O Diabo”) is the story of the Devil who sits wellbehaved at the table but who is quickly led astray by children. Mythologies is a universe of fiction by Gonçalo M. Tavares, the result of a five-year creative process, a unique work of great literary richness and brilliance, using the narrative tradition of orality and fantasy, in which the author places humankind and history in a mythological dimension that he distorts, to show and explore more fully what is human nature. It is a return to ‘Once Upon a Time’ set in a mythical time, mixing dates and swapping narrative orders, in a space without geographical location.
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Five Children, Five Rats
In the middle of the forest, five children lost. Or four. Because the youngest of the sisters got lost from those who were already lost. The children find a man-with-the-evil-eye, but he‘s good. They also encounter Speed, which is a dangerous element that makes men mad. There is a Train that does not like humans and a man who cannot stop gawping at the world. There is a tiny church where a body can barely fit, but this body has room to pray. And there are those who come out cured of very small spaces. In Five Children, Five Rats (“Cinco Meninos, Cinco Ratos”) we are in a mythological narrative, and machines and animals have since long ceased to be mere helpers or friends. There are very hungry machines.
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The Woman-Without-a-Head and the Man-With-the-Evil-Eye
In The Woman-Without-a-Head and the Man-With-the-Evil-Eye (“A Mulher Sem-Cabeça e o Homem-do-Mau-Olhado”), Gonçalo M. Tavares repositions mankind and history within a mythological dimension, which he distorts in order to clarify, and through which, using the narrative universe of orality and fantasy, he brilliantly explores the essence of human nature. A woman’s head is beaten off, but she can still walk upright. A man with an evil eye cannot look at his bride. Five children of the king are devoured by a machine. A famous neurologist wants to give a poor madman a smile. And a group of downtrodden wretches builds a flying machine to flee before the revolution. If Kafka had rewritten Ovid’s “Metamorphoses”, this book would have been the result.
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Encyclopaedia // Short Notes on Literature-Bloom
The effort to distinguish various forms of knowledge production has been a constant occupation of Tavares; in particular distinguishing independent science from literature, the main theme of the last part of Encyclopaedia (“Encyclopédia”), entitled Short Notes on Literature-Bloom (“Breves Notas sobre a Literatura-Bloom”). Science, according to Tavares, is focussed on all that can be repeated; literature, on everything that is unrepeatable. Science was created to resolve paradoxes and contradictions; literature, on the contrary, requires “specialists in mystery”. But not mysteries for detectives, Tavares points out, not those mysteries that end with the discovery of the murderer: to study mystery means increasing, not decreasing it, so that at the end of Literature-Bloom the reader knows less facts than he did before. This paradoxical logic, this wild arithmetic, is one of the central issues of Tavares poetic and literary language: to domestication, it counters with estrangement; to the desire to control, the ethics of dispossession.
(Borja Bagunyà)
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His Excellency, The Circumlucologist
His Excellency, The Circumlucologist (“O Torcicologologista, Excelência”) is a work of fiction: ironic and capable of making one burst out in laughter, but also a painful book, composed of two very different parts. The first, wherein disenchantment intersects with corrosive humor, is composed of fictional dialogues between two characters, the Excellencies, created and developed over a few years by Gonçalo M. Tavares in the pages of a newspaper. Your Excellency speaks to Your Excellency, and–in the middle of the absurdity that is existence and the attempt to understand it–the two discourse on good and evil, revolutions, boredom, dance and laziness, big questions and minor mishaps, leaps forward and major downfalls. Continuous irony, humor, and sabotage of thought and language progress in the dialogue between these two curious Excellencies, characters of impeccable manners and a quick, comical wit.
The second part of O Torcicologologista, Excelência takes the reader to commotion of the city, to the small gestures and great tragedies that there reside. An accelerated tragedy in which an abrupt zoom into and quick glance at humanity brings a collective character to the foreground: the city, the modern city, with its illnesses, its obsessions, and, sometimes, its hopes.
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A Girl is Lost in Her Century Looking for Her Father
A Girl is Lost in Her Century Looking for Her Father (“Uma Menina Está Perdida no seu Século à Procura do Pai”) tells the story of Hanna, a 12-year-old girl with Down’s syndrome. Together with Marius, a man who seems to be hiding from something, she embarks on a journey through cities haunted by traces of World War II. Once more, Tavares takes his readers to a dismal world that poses existential questions.
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Old People Want to Live Too
The Greek myth of the tragedy Alceste, by the playwright Euripides, is revived in Old People Want to Live Too (“Os Velhos Também Querem Viver”). In this novel-poem, Gonçalo M. Tavares stages the drama in contemporary Sarajevo and discusses issues such as death, love, sacrifice, the value of thousands of lives, and the value of just one.
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Atlas of the Body and the Imagination
Atlas of the Body and the Imagination (“Atlas do corpo e da imaginação”) is a multilayered essay that revolves around literature and art, addressing topics like fiction, identity, technology and desire. With a firm hand and lucid spirit, Tavares guides us around the labyrinthine world we live in, revisiting the work of some of the most important contemporary thinkers, among them Wittgenstein, Hannah Arendt and Nietzsche.
Please find here the trailer of the Portuguese edition: > Atlas do corpo e da imaginação Booktrailer
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A Voyage to India
Gonçalo M. Tavares’ novel A Voyage to India (“Uma Viagem à Índia”) is a mental journey as well as a physical one. Written in easily accessible language, which stands in stark contrast to its epic form inspired by The Lusiads, A Voyage to India relates the experiences Bloom has on his way to India and back.
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The Neighbourhood
The Neighbourhood (“O Bairro”) describes a utopian neighbourhood whose characters share the names of great artists and writers, almost a literary version of Asterix’s village.
From an impressive list of works published in swift succession which surprise readers by their philosophical mind quizzes, diffidently and ironically told events and broad stylistic variations, choice is made here of a number in which the main protagonist is a “Senhor”: Mr Valéry and Logic (”O Senhor Valéry e a Lógica“) embraces 25 short, playfully-philosophical stories about Mr. Valéry, who is short but tries hard to adapt to his surroundings, more or less successfully. With apparent childlike naivety he upsets the rules of logic and reason. For example, he jumps up and down in order to be as tall as his fellow men, declaring: I am as tall as tall people, only for a shorter while.
Mr Henri and the Encyclopaedia (”O Senhor Henri e a Enciclopédia“), a close relative of Mr. Valéry’s, is a bit more egocentric and conceited and likes to dabble in paradoxical matters and linguistic games, besides being very partial to absinthe. Mister Henri says … it’s true that if a man mixes absinthe with reality it makes for a better reality … yet it’s also the case that if a man mixes absinthe with reality it makes for a worse reality …
Mr Swedenborg and the Geometrical Investigations (”O Senhor Swedenborg e as Investigações Geométricas“), the latest resident in the writer’s quarter, is based on a Swedish scientist, theologian and mystic who, in the eighteenth century, wrote a large amount of fiction in Latin. Tavares’ Swedenborg uses the lectures that his colleagues and the people living in his neighbourhood give, to help him think through and carry out his geometric research. His reflections on memory, the mirror, seduction, desire, death and dozens of other things, are acute observations on life, always from a geometric and logical perspective and written in the familiar and jocular tone of the Senhores.
And other gentlemen, neighbours in a fictional writers´quarter, are introduced in book form such as Mr. Brecht, Mr. Juarroz, Mr. Calvino, Mr. Walser, Mr. Kraus and Mr. Eliot.
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The Kingdom
In a series which the author calls The Kingdom (“O Reino”), Tavares has published four novels which – this time in a less playful manner – address the topic of the essence of human existence.
Just like Walser’s dark notebooks, Gonçalo M. Tavares’ Black Books continue to give their version of the world we live in, […] of individual conscience, and the fragility of a human being in the play of existential forces, and the indifference or alienation of the individual. Joseph Walser’s Machine (“A Máquina de Joseph Walser”), following Klaus Klump: A Man (“Um Homem: Klaus Klump”), is constructed as an attempt at apprehending the essence of humanity, drawing on material with the soul of a frighteningly rational world.
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Jerusalém
In Jerusalém Ernst Spengler finds himself alone in the night of the 29th of May. He is about to throw himself out of the window. Suddenly the phone rings. Change of scene: The thirty-year-old Mylia is in her apartment and suffering great pain. She is terminally ill. She leaves the flat to go to a church. Ever since the war ended, Hinnerek Obst can not go out into the street without fear. For his eerie guise he is taken to be a murderer. He too is roaming the streets this night. Theodor Busbeck, doctor, historian and ex-husband of Mylia likewise leaves his apartment at 3 am in the morning in search of a prostitute. Mylia had one day turned up at his surgery and said I am schizophrenically mad. Would you like to cure me? The two had married. Later, however, Theodor left his wife in a psychiatric clinic. For years he had worked on developing a mathematical formula to foresee future crimes in the history of mankind.
In a clear and objective language, this book tells a strange and disconcerting story. It seems as though a secret force is leading the individual characters to their encounter in this particular night. A world coined by violence, fear, pain and insanity is evoked. The author succeeds in combining an exceedingly attention-grabbing story full of surprising contemplations on human nature with the diverse mechanisms of the exertion of power.
Jerusalém has been selected for the Portuguese edition of “1001 books to read before dying – a chronological guide to the most important novels of all times”. The novel appears alongside works by Philip Roth and John Banville.
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Matteo Lost His Job
In his novel Matteo Lost His Job (“Matteo Perdeu o Emprego”), Tavares explores the course of his protagonist’s destiny. Matteo answers an advertisement for a job and the woman who interviews him has a peculiar characteristic: she has no arms. His duty will be to accompany her and do everything that she cannot do. He takes the job because it is the first offer he’s received in several months, but he doesn’t like it and leaves it. He spends a few more months unemployed until he responds to a new ad. The man he meets has no arms.
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Stories by Mister Valéry
In The Shoes. Stories by Mister Valéry (“Os Sapatos. Histórias do Senhor Valéry”) Mr. Valéry walks in the street with a white shoe on his left foot and a black shoe on his right foot. Sometimes it’s the other way around. But he is never wrong. He gets irritated when people tell him that he has mixed up his shoes. He then switches his shoes, but receives the same reaction. He gets even more irritated. According to his logic, one of these two situations has to be right for the other to be wrong, since they are inverse. He decides he is indifferent to the subject, because if they say both situations are wrong, it is because they are both right. In this unusual work for children, Gonçalo M. Tavares explores the limits of logic and philosophical principles in a creative and entertaining way.
For Mr. Valéry, holidays are the times when no one can require you to make decisions. The difficult thing is to find the ideal house where he can rest. In an attempt to discover the best place, in The Holiday House. Stories by Mister Valéry (“A Casa de Férias. Histórias do Senhor Valéry”) Mr. Valéry imagines different houses, which by their specific but always unusual structure can offer him the rest he deserves. However, his imagination does not stop working and surprises us with ever more incredible propositions, revealing his extraordinary power.
In The Friends. Stories by Mister Valéry (“Os Amigos. Histórias do Senhor Valéry”), Mr. Valéry is small but jumps a lot, so he explains that he is “like tall people but only for a short time.” But “if tall people jumped, he would never reach them vertically” and, persistent in his learning, he abandons the exercise and begins new experiments: first a bench, then a bench with wheels, even thinking about how to “freeze a jump”. “When concentrating, Mr Valéry could actually see the tops of the heads of people who were much taller than him,” but with the vision from above “he had difficulty remembering the faces of the people he met. “With height, Mr. Valéry lost friends.”So finally he decides to be tall only in his head.
In The Two Sides. Stories by Mister Valéry (“Os Dois Lados. Histórias do Senhor Valéry”), Mr Valéry has a problem to solve: how to always be on the right side of the world? Mr Valéry’s dilemma calls for rules, and his steps in seeking this knowledge show us the absurdity of a mental system, touching us in our awareness of the absurdities that we all, at some point, raise.
Developing the theory that the world has two sides, “the right and the left,” Mr Valéry implements a disciplined and rigorous methodology: he divides his house into two parts and “only touches the things that were on his left with the left hand and the things on his right hand with his right hand”. Furthermore, in order never to deceive himself in rigorously always using the “right” hand, even when lying on his back, he painted “the whole left side of the house, including every object, in blue” and the other side in red. But so as to make no mistake, Mr. Valéry had another great trick: his left hand was also painted blue and his right hand red.
AWARDS
INTERNATIONAL AWARDS
Prix Laure Bataillon 2021 (France, French translation of The Neighbourhood)
Bellas Artes Prize for the Best Translation MARGARITA MICHELENA 2019 (Mexico, with A Girl is Lost in Her Century Looking for Her Father)
University of Lisbon Prize 2019 (for his body of work)
Prémio Roménia – Literatura Sem Fronteiras 2018 (for his body of work)
Vergílio Ferreira Prize 2017 (Portugal)
Prémio Tabula Rasa 2015 (Portugal, with A Girl Is Lost in Her Century Looking for Her Father)
Radoje Tatić Translation Award 2014 (Croatia, with Histórias falsas)
Prix Littéraire Européen 2011, Étudiants Francophones (France, with Mr Kraus and Politics)
Special Price of the Jury of the Grand Prix Littéraire du Web Cultura 2010 (France)
Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger 2010 (France); This award has already been given to authors like Salmon Rushdie, Elias Canetti, Robert Musil, Orhan Pamuk, John Updike, Philip Roth, Gabriel García Márquez and Colm Tóibín, among others.
Belgrad Poetry Award 2009 (Serbia)
International Prize of Triest 2008 (Italy)
Prêmio Portugal Telecom 2007 (Brazil)
AWARDS FOR HIS NOVEL JERUSALÉM
Prêmio Portugal Telecom de Literatura em Língua Portuguesa 2007
Prêmio José Saramago 2005
Prêmio LER/Millennium BCP 2004
AWARDS FOR ÁGUA, CÃO, CAVALO, CABEÇA
Grande Prêmio de Conto da Associação Portuguesa de Escritores “Camilo Castelo Branco” 2007
AWARDS FOR A VOYAGE TO INDIA
Prémio Fundação Inês de Castro 2012
Prémio Literário Fernando Namora 2011
Grande Prêmio Romance e Novela da Associação Portuguesa de Autores 2011
Prémio Portugal Telecom de Literatura 2011
Prêmio Especial de Imprensa Melhor Livro 2010 Ler/Booktailors
SPA Author’s Prize 2010
NOMINATED FOR
Prix Jean Monnet de Littérature Européenne (2019, with A Girl Is Lost in Her Century Looking for Her Father)
Shortlisted for the Prémio Oceanos (2016, with A Girl Is Lost in Her Century Looking for Her Father)
Prix Femina (2016, France, with Matteo Lost His Job)
Pen Award for Novel, Portuguese Pen Club (2015, A Girl Is Lost in Her Century Looking for Her Father)
Prix Jean-Monnet de Littérature Européenne (2015, France, with Klaus Klump: A Man and Joseph Walser’s Machine)
International IMPAC Dublin award (2013, Ireland, with Learning to Pray in the Age of Technology)
Longlist of the Best Translated Book Award Fiction (2013, USA, with Joseph Walser’s Machine)
Europese Literatuurprijs (2013, Netherlands, with Learning to Pray in the Age of Technology)
Prix Médicis Étranger (2012, France, with A Voyage to India)
Prix Médicis Étranger (2010, France, with Learning to Pray in the Age of Technology)
Prix Femina (2010, France, with Learning to Pray in the Age of Technology)
Prix Cévennes (2009, France, with Jerusalém, award for the Best European Novel)
RIGHTS
DIARY-FICTION (DIÁRIO FICÇÃO)
In America, Said Jonathan (“Na América, Disse Jonathan”)
Lisbon: Relógio d’Água 2019, 112 p.
Germany: Kupido Literaturverlag 2021
MYTHOLOGIES (MITOLOGIAS)
The Devil (”O Diabo“)
Lisbon: Bertrand 2022, 200 p.
Brazil: Dublinense
Five Children, Five Rats (”Cinco Meninos, Cinco Ratos“)
Lisbon: Bertand 2018, 228 p.
Brazil: Dublinense, 2019 · France: Viviane Hamy 2022
The Woman-Without-a-Head and the Man-With-the-Evil-Eye (”A Mulher Sem Cabeça e o Homem do Mau-Olhado“)
Lisbon: Bertrand 2017, 152 p.
Extract published at Granta, UK
Brazil: Dublinense 2019 · Egypt: Masr El-Arabia 2018 · France: Viviane Hamy 2022
NOVELS
The Middle Bone (”O Osso do Meio“)
Lisbon: Relógio d’Água 2020, 132 p.
Brazil: Companhia das Letras · Egypt: Masr El Arab 2021 · France: Viviane Hamy, forthcoming September 2024 · USA: Dalkey Archive Press
A Girl Is Lost in Her Century Looking for Her Father (”Uma Menina Está Perdida no seu Século à Procura do Pai“)
Porto: Porto Editora 2014, 200 p.
Engl. translation by Daniel Hahn available
Argentina: Letranómada 2015 · Brazil: Companhia das Letras 2015 · France: Viviane Hamy 2018 · Lebanon: Dar al Rafidain · Mexico: Almadía 2018 · Poland: Wydawnictwo Literackie 2022 · Spain: Seix Barral 2016 · Turkey: Kirmizi Kedi 2022 · USA: Dalkey Archive Press
Old People Want to Live Too (“Os Velhos Também Querem Viver”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2014, 96 p.
Brazil: Foz 2015 · Canada: Guernica Editions · Iraq: Layeth Alhjan Hamad· Peru: Animal de Invierno
A Voyage to India (”Uma Viagem à Índia“)
Lisbon: Caminho 2010, 484 p.
Voted among the Best Books of the Year 2014 by El País and ABC Cultural
Argentina: Letranómada 2014 · Brazil: Leya 2010 · Bulgaria: Colibri 2016 · Catalan: Periscopi 2013 · Croatia: Vukovic & Runjic 2018 · France: Viviane Hamy 2012, 2022 · Mexico: Almadía · Romania: Univers 2014 · Spain: Seix Barral 2014, 5th edition 2018, 6th ed. 2019 · USA: Dalkey Archive 2016
Matteo Lost His Job (”Matteo Perdeu o Emprego“)
Porto: Porto Editora 2010, 210 p.
Brazil: Foz 2013 · Bulgaria: Ergo Publishing House 2021 · France: Viviane Hamy 2016 · Italy: Nottetempo 2016 · Kuwait: Alsurra 2019 · Peru: Animal de Invierno 2018 · Spain: Seix Barral 2023 · Sweden: Tranan 2018
Trilogy “O Reino” (The Kingdom)
Learning to Pray in the Age of Technology (“Aprender a Rezar na Era da Técnica”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2007, 383 p.
Argentina: Letranómada 2013 · Brazil: Companhia das Letras 2008 · Bulgaria: Five Plus · Colombia: Uniandes · Egypt: Masr El-Arabia 2019 · France: Viviane Hamy 2010 · Hungary: L’ Harmattan 2013 · India: Falcon Books · Italy: Feltrinelli 2011 · Macedonia: Dooel · Mexico: Almadía 2013 · Poland: Wydawnictwa Literackie 2015 · Romania: Vivaldi 2011 · Serbia: Treci Trg · Slovenia: Modrijan 2009 · Spain: Mondadori 2012, Seix Barral 2018 · The Netherlands: Querido 2012 · Turkey: Kirmizi Kedi 2017 · USA: Dalkey Archive Press 2011
Jerusalém
Lisbon: Círculo de Leitores 2004; Caminho 2005, 251 p.
Film rights under option
Albania: Fjala 2016 · Argentina: Letranómada 2010 · Armenia: Vernatun Pubslihing· Brazil: Companhia das Letras 2006, pb 2017 · Bulgaria: Five Plus 2009 · Catalan: El Gall 2018 · Colombia: Uniandes · Croatia: Sysprint 2009 · Czech Republic: Studio Rubato · Denmark: Aurora Boreal 2021 · Egypt: Masr El-Arabi 2016 · Estonia: Ilmamaa 2014 · France: Viviane Hamy 2008, pb 2012 · Galician: Rinoceronte 2024 · Germany: DVA 2012 · Greece: Kastaniotis 2012 · Hungary: Nagyvilág 2008 · Iceland: Una útgáfuhús 2023 · Israel: Kinneret 2009 · Italy: Guanda 2006 (avail.) · Japan: Kawade Shobo 2021 · Korea: Open Books 2011 · Latvia: Janis Roze · Lithuania: Lithuanian Writer’s Union · Macedonia: Blesok 2013 · Mexico: Almadía 2009 · Poland: Swiat 2010 · Romania: Humanitas 2008 · Serbia/Montenegro: Treći Trg 2009 · Slovenia: Modrijan Zalozba 2008 · Spain: Mondadori 2009, Seix Barral 2018 · Sweden: Lusima 2009 · The Netherlands: Querido 2011 · Turkey: Kirmizi Kedi 2012 · USA: Dalkey Archive Press 2009
Klaus Klump: A Man (“Um Homem: Klaus Klump“)
Lisbon: Caminho 2003, 2004, 2008 (Machine + Klaus Klump), 136 p.; Círculo de Leitores 2006
Shortlisted for the Prix Jean-Monnet de Littérature Européenne 2015
Voted among the Best Books of the Year 2014 by the English literary magazine Gorse
Brazil: Companhia das Letras 2007 · Bulgaria: Five Plus 2010 · Colombia: Uniandes 2017 · Croatia: Vukovic & Runjic (Machine + Klaus Klump) 2017 · Egypt: Masr El Arabia · France: Viviane Hamy 2014 (Machine + Klaus Klump) · Indonesia: Yayasan Pustaka Obor 2019 · Romania: Paralela45 2018 · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 (Machine + Klaus Klump) · Slovakia: Portugalsky Institute · Spain: Mondadori 2006, Seix Barral 2018 · Turkey: Kirmizi Kedi (Machine + Klaus Klump) 2016 · USA: Dalkey Archive 2014
Joseph Walser’s Machine (“A Máquina de Joseph Walser”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2003, 2004, 2008 (Machine + Klaus Klump), 168 p.; Círculo de Leitores 2006
Shortlisted for the Prix Jean-Monnet de Littérature Européenne 2015
Brazil: Companhia das Letras 2010 · Bulgaria: Five Plus 2011 · Colombia: Uniandes 2017 · Croatia: Vukovic & Runjic (Machine + Klaus Klump) 2017 · Egypt: Masr El Arabia · France: Viviane Hamy 2014 (Machine + Klaus Klump) · Germany: DVA 2014 · Paraguay: Ediciones de la Ura · Romania: Paralela45 2018 · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 (Machine + Klaus Klump) · Spain: Mondadori 2007, Seix Barral 2018 · Turkey: Kirmizi Kedi (Machine + Klaus Klump) 2016 · USA: Dalkey Archive 2012
O Bairro (The Neighbourhood):
Voted among the Best Books of the Year 2014 in Argentina
Mr Valéry and Logic (“O Senhor Valéry e a Lógica”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2002, 80 p.
Prix Laure Bataillon 2021 for the best book translated in France
Argentina: Interzona · Belgium: Orfeu · Brazil: Escritos 2004, Casa da Palavra 2011, Editora Nós · Bulgaria: Ergo Books 2020 · China: Shanghai 99 2016 · Costa Rica: Editorial Costa Rica 2016 · Croatia: Sysprint 2008 · Czech Republic: SMRST 2011 · France: Viviane Hamy 2008, 2020 · German: Korrespondenzen 2020 · Greece: Kastaniotis 2016 · Guatemala: Catafixia · India: Transbooks 2005 (English for India only) · Italy: Guanda 2005, Nottetempo 2014, Noi Edizioni · Korea: Open Books · Kuwait: Alsurra 2018 · Macedonia: Begemot 2020 · Mexico: Almadía 2012 · Morocco: Racines 2011 · Poland: Bertelsmann Media 2007 · Romania: Allfa · Russia: Alexandria · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 · Slovakia: Portugalsky Institute 2017 · Slovenia: Beletrina 2008 · Spain: Mondadori 2006, Seix Baral 2015, 2019, 2022 · Sweden: Tranan 2012 · Switzerland: La Joie de Lire 2003 (French) · Turkey: Kirmizi Kedi 2014 · USA: Texas Tech University Press 2012
Mr Henri and the Encyclopaedia (“O Senhor Henri e a Enciclopédia”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2003, 95 p.
Argentina: Interzona 2012 · Belgium: Orfeu · Brazil: Escritos 2004, Casa da Palavra 2011, Editora Nós · Bulgaria: Ergo Books 2020 · China: Shanghai 99 2016 · Costa Rica: Editorial Costa Rica 2016 · Croatia: Sysprint 2008 · France: Viviane Hamy 2020 · German: Korrespondenzen 2020 · Greece: Kastaniotis 2016 · Guatemala: Catafixia · India: Transbooks 2005 (English for India only) · Italy: Noi Edizioni · Korea: Open Books 2015 · Kuwait: Alsurra 2018 · Macedonia: Begemot 2020 · Mexico: Almadía 2012 · Poland: Bertelsmann Media 2007 · Romania: Allfa · Russia: Alexandria · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 · Slovakia: Portugalsky Institute 2017 · Slovenia: Beletrina 2008 · Spain: Mondadori 2007, Seix Baral 2015, 2019, 2022 · Turkey: Kirmizi Kedi 2014 · USA: Texas Tech University Press 2012
Mr Brecht and Success (“O Senhor Brecht e o Sucesso”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2004, 100 p.
Argentina: Interzona 2012 · Belgium: Orfeu · Brazil: Casa da Palavra 2005, Editora Nós · Bulgaria: Ergo Books 2020 · China: Shanghai 99 2016 · Costa Rica: Editorial Costa Rica 2016 · Croatia: Sysprint 2008 · Czech Republic: SMRST 2012 · France: Viviane Hamy 2010, 2020 · German: Korrespondenzen 2020 · Greece: Kastaniotis 2016 · Guatemala: Catafixia · India: Transbooks 2006 (English for India only) · Italy: Noi Edizioni · Korea: Open Books 2015 · Macedonia: Begemot 2020 · Mexico: Almadía 2012 · Poland: Bertelsmann Media 2007 · Romania: Allfa · Russia: Alexandria · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 · Slovakia: Portugalsky Institute 2018 · Slovenia: Beletrina 2008 · Spain: Mondadori 2007, Seix Baral 2015, 2019, 2022 · Sweden: Tranan 2012 · Turkey: Kirmizi Kedi 2014
Mr Juarroz and Thought (”O Senhor Juarroz e o Pensamento“)
Lisbon: Caminho 2004, 88 p.
Argentina: Interzona 2012 · Belgium: Orfeu · Brazil: Casa da Palavra 2006, Editora Nós · Bulgaria: Ergo Books 2020 · Costa Rica: Editorial Costa Rica 2016 · Croatia: Sysprint 2008 · France: Viviane Hamy 2020 · German: Korrespondenzen 2020 · Greece: Kastaniotis 2016 · Guatemala: Catafixia · India: Transbooks 2007 (English for India only) · Italy: Noi Edizioni · Korea: Open Books 2015 · Kuwait: Alsurra 2018 · Macedonia: Begemot 2020 · Mexico: Almadía 2012 · Poland: Bertelsmann Media 2007 · Romania: Allfa · Russia: Alexandria · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 · Slovakia: Portugalsky Institute 2017 · Slovenia: Beletrina 2008 · Spain: Seix Baral 2015, 2019, 2022 · Sweden: Tranan 2012 · Turkey: Kirmizi Kedi 2014 · USA: Texas Tech University Press 2012
Mr Calvin and the Promenade (“O Senhor Calvino e o Passeio”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2005, 71 p.
Argentina: Interzona · Belgium: Orfeu · Brazil: Casa da Palavra 2006, Editora Nós · Bulgaria: Ergo Books 2020 · China: Shanghai 99 2016 · Costa Rica: Editorial Costa Rica 2016 · Croatia: Sysprint 2008 · France: Viviane Hamy 2009, 2020 · German: Korrespondenzen 2022 · Greece: Kastaniotis 2016 · Guatemala: Catafixia · India: Transbooks 2007 (English for India only) · Italy: Guanda 2007, Nottetempo 2014, Noi Edizioni · Korea: Open Books · Kuwait: Alsurra 2018 · Macedonia: Begemot 2020 · Mexico: Almadía 2012 · Poland: Bertelsmann Media 2007 · Romania: Allfa · Russia: Alexandria · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 · Slovakia: Portugalsky Institute 2018 · Slovenia: Beletrina 2008 · Spain: Seix Baral 2015, 2019, 2022 · Sweden: Tranan 2012 · Turkey: Kirmizi Kedi 2014 · USA: Texas Tech University Press 2012
Mr Kraus and Politics (“O Senhor Kraus e a Política”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2005, 116 p.
Argentina: Interzona · Belgium: Orfeu · Brazil: Casa da Palavra 2006, Editora Nós · Bulgaria: Ergo Books 2020 · Costa Rica: Editorial Costa Rica 2016 · Croatia: Sysprint 2008 · Czech Republic: SMRST 2012 · France: Viviane Hamy 2009, 2020 · German: Korrespondenzen 2021 · Greece: Kastaniotis 2016 · Guatemala: Catafixia · India: Transbooks 2008 (English for India only) · Italy: Nottetempo 2014, Noi Edizioni · Korea: Open Books · Kuwait: Alsurra 2018 · Macedonia: Begemot 2020 · Mexico: Almadía 2012 · Poland: Bertelsmann Media 2007 · Romania: Allfa · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 · Slovakia: Portugalsky Institute 2018 · Slovenia: Beletrina 2008 · Spain: Seix Baral 2015, 2019, 2022 · USA: Texas Tech University Press 2012 · Venezuela: Madera Fina
Mr Walser and the Forest (“O Senhor Walser e a Floresta”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2006, 48 p.
Argentina: Interzona · Belgium: Orfeu · Brazil: Casa da Palavra 2008, Editora Nós · Bulgaria: Ergo Books 2020 · Costa Rica: Editorial Costa Rica 2016 · Croatia: Sysprint 2008 · France: Viviane Hamy 2011, 2020 · Germany: Korrespondenzen 2023 · Greece: Kastaniotis 2016 · Guatemala: Catafixia · Italy: Nottetempo 2014, Noi Edizioni · Korea: Open Books · Kuwait: Alsurra 2018 · Macedonia: Begemot 2020 · Mexico: Almadía 2012 · Romania: Allfa · Russia: Alexandria · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 · Slovakia: Portugalsky Institute 2018 · Slovenia: Beletrina 2008 · Spain: Seix Baral 2015, 2019, 2022 · Turkey: Kirmizi Kedi 2014 · USA: Texas Tech University Press 2012 · Venezuela: Madera Fina
Mr Breton and the Interview (“O Senhor Breton e a Entrevista”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2008, 56 p.
Argentina: Interzona · Belgium: Orfeu · Brazil: Casa da Palavra 2009, Editora Nós · Bulgaria: Ergo Books 2020 · Costa Rica: Editorial Costa Rica 2016 · France: Viviane Hamy 2008, 2020 · German: Korrespondenzen 2024 · Greece: Kastaniotis 2016 · Guatemala: Catafixia · Italy: Urogallo 2023 · Korea: Open Books · Macedonia: Begemot 2020 · Mexico: Almadía 2012 · Romania: Allfa · Russia: Alexandria · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 · Slovakia: Portugalsky Institute 2018 · Spain: Témenos (Catalan), Seix Baral 2015; 2019; 2022 · Venezuela: Madera Fina
Mr Swedenborg and the Geometrical Investigations (“O Senhor Swedenborg e as investigações geométricas”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2009, 111 p.
Argentina: Interzona 2012 · Belgium: Orfeu · Brazil: Casa da Palavra 2011, Editora Nós · Bulgaria: Ergo Books 2020 · Costa Rica: Editorial Costa Rica 2016 · France: Viviane Hamy 2014, 2022 · German: Korrespondenzen · Greece: Kastaniotis 2016 · Guatemala: Catafixia · Italy: Noi Edizioni · Korea: Open Books 2015 · Macedonia: Begemot 2020 · Mexico: Almadía 2012 · Romania: Allfa · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 · Slovakia: Portugalsky Institute 2018 · Spain: Seix Baral 2015, 2019, 2022 · Sweden: Tranan 2012 · Venezuela: Madera Fina
Mr Eliot and the Conferences (“O Senhor Eliot e as Conferências”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2010, 74 p.
Argentina: Interzona 2012 · Belgium: Orfeu · Brazil: Casa da Palavra 2011, Editora Nós · Bulgaria: Ergo Books 2020 · Costa Rica: Editorial Costa Rica 2016 · France: Viviane Hamy 2015 · German: Korrespondenzen · Greece: Kastaniotis 2016 · Guatemala: Catafixia · Italy: Noi Edizioni · Korea: Open Books 2015 · Macedonia: Begemot 2020 · Mexico: Almadía 2012 · Romania: Allfa · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 · Slovakia: Portugalsky Institute 2018 · Spain: Seix Baral 2015, 2019, 2022 · Sweden: Tranan 2012 · Venezuela: Madera Fina
DIARY
Plague Diary (“Diário da Peste”)
Lisbon: Relógio D’Água 2021, 312 p.
Complete English translation available
Argentina: Interzona 2020 · Brasil: Nós · Bulgaria: Ergo Publishing 2022 · Canada/USA: Quattro Books · France: Bouquins 2022· Greece: Kastaniotis 2021 · Italy: Noi · Moldova (Romanian): Cartier 2022 · Romania: Casa Cărţii de Ştiinţă · Spain: Días Contados (only in Spain) 2022
DIALOGUE FICTION
His Excellency, The Circumlucologist (“O Torcicologologista, Excelência”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2015, 304 p.
Brazil: Dublinense 2017
ESSAYS
The Stone and the Drawing (“A Pedra e o Desenho”)
Lisbon: Relogio D´Agua 2022, 80 p.
Spain: La Umbría y la Solana
Atlas of the Body and the Imagination (“Atlas do Corpo e da Imaginação”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2013, 533 p.
Italy: Nova Delphi · Mexico: Matadero 2018 · Brazil: Dublinense 2021
ENCICLOPÉDIA (ESSAY-FICTION)
Short Notes on the Orient (“Breves Notas Sobre o Oriente”)
Lisbon: Relógio D’Água 2023, 104 p.
Dictionary of Artists (“Dicionário de Artistas”)
Lisbon: Relógio D’Água 2021, 136 p.
Brazil: Dublinense 2023 · Spain: La Umbría y la Solana
Short Notes on Literature-Bloom (“Breves Notas sobre a Literatura-Bloom”)
Lisbon: Relógio d’Água 2016, 96 p.
Argentina: Letranómada · Chile: Puntángeles · Costa Rica: Encino · Italy: Urogallo 2023 · Mexico: Matadero 2018 · Poland: Wydawnictwo slowo 2018 · Romania: Scoala Ardeleana · Spain: Xordica · Spain (Catalan): Edicions del Periscopi 2016 · Uruguay: HUM · USA: Quantum Prose 2019
Short Notes on Music (“Breves Notas sobre a Música”)
Lisbon: Relógio d’Água 2015, 120 p.
Argentina: Letranómada · Chile: Puntángeles · Costa Rica: Encino · Italy: Urogallo 2023 · Mexico: Matadero 2018 · Poland: Wydawnictwo slowo 2018 · Romania: Scoala Ardeleana · Spain: Xordica · Spain (Catalan): Edicions del Periscopi· Uruguay: HUM· USA: Quantum Prose 2019
Short Notes on Connections (Llansol, Molder, and Zambrano) (“Breves Notas sobre as Ligações (Llansol, Molder e Zambrano)”)
Lisbon: Relógio d’Água 2009, 96 p.
Argentina: Letranómada 2010 · Brazil: Design 2009 · Chile: Puntángeles · Costa Rica: Encino · Colombia: Uniandes 2016 · Ecuador: Paradiso · Italy: Urogallo 2023 · Mexico: Aldus 2010 · Peru: Colmena · Poland: Wydawnictwo slowo 2018 · Romania: Scoala Ardeleana · Spain: Regional de Extremadura 2010, Xordica · Uruguay: HUM· USA: Quantum Prose 2019
Short Notes on Fear (“Breves Notas sobre o Medo”)
Lisbon: Relógio d’Água 2007, 69 p.
Argentina: Letranómada · Brazil: Design 2009 · Chile: Puntángeles · Colombia: Uniandes 2016 · Costa Rica: Encino · Ecuador: Paradiso · Italy: Urogallo 2023 · Mexico: Aldus 2010 · Peru: Colmena · Poland: Wydawnictwo slowo 2018 · Romania: Scoala Ardeleana · Spain: Regional de Extremadura 2010, Xordica · Uruguay: HUM· USA: Quantum Prose 2019
Short Notes on Science (“Breves Notas sobre a Ciência”)
Lisbon: Relógio d’Água 2006, 145 p.
English translation available at asymptotejournal.com
Argentina: Letranómada · Brazil: Design 2009 · Costa Rica: Encino · Colombia: Uniandes 2016 · Ecuador: Paradiso · Italy: Urogallo 2023 · Mexico: Aldus 2010 · Peru: Colmena · Poland: Wydawnictwo slowo 2018 · Romania: Scoala Ardeleana · Spain: Regional de Extremadura 2010, Xordica · Uruguay: HUM· USA: Quantum Prose 2019
BLOOM BOOKS
The Left Leg of Paris Followed by Roland Barthes and Robert Musil (“A Perna Esquerda de Paris Seguido de Roland Barthes e Robert Musil”)
Lisbon: Relógio d’ Água 2004, 166 p.
Brazil: Lumme · Chile: Alquimia
THEATRE
The Man is either Silly or a Woman (“O Homem ou É Tonto ou É Mulher”)
Porto: Campo das Letras 2003, 76 p.
Brazil: Casa da Palavra 2005
Samuel Beckett’s Spoon and other Texts (“A Colher de Samuel Beckett e outros Textos”)
Porto: Campo das Letras 2002, 82 p.
Brazil: Arte & Letra
SONGS (CANÇÕES)
Água, Cão, Cavalo, Cabeça
Lisbon: Caminho 2006, 91 p.
Argentina: Letranómada 2008 · Austria/Germany: Verlag der Apfel 2008 · Italy: Il Filo 2009 · Mexico: Almadía 2009 · Romania: Scoala Ardealeana 2021 (in the anthology “Cântece”) · Spain: Xordica 2010
Mexican Songs (“Canções Mexicanas”)
Lisbon: Relógio d’Água 2011, 96 p.
Brazil: Casa da Palavra 2013 · Mexico: Almadía 2013 · Puerto Rico: Trabalis 2016 · Romania: Scoala Ardealeana 2021 (in the anthology “Cântece”)
Animalistic (“Animalescos”)
Lisbon: Relógio d’Água 2013, 144 p.
Bolivia: El Cuervo 2021 · Brazil: Dublinense 2015, 2019 · Romania: Scoala Ardealeana 2021 (in the anthology “Cântece”) · Spain: Kriller 71
STORIES
False Stories (“Histórias Falsas”)
Lisbon: Campo das Letras 2005, Caminho 2014, 96 p.
Argentina: Letranómada 2008 · Brazil: Casa da Palavra 2008 · Catalonia: El Gall 2015· Colombia: El Pelegrino · Cuba: Feria del Libro de la Habana 2014 · Ecuador: Paradiso 2013 · El Salvador: Los Sin Pisto 2022 · Honduras: Mimalapalabra 2022· Italy: Urogallo 2020 · Lebanon: Dar al Rafidain · Mexico: Almadía 2008 · Serbia: Treci Trg 2014 · Spain: Xordica 2008 · Russia: OGI
SHORT PROSE
Bucareste-Budapeste: Budapeste-Bucareste
Lisbon: Relógio D’Água, 2019, 108 p.
Brazil: Oficina Raquel 2022 · Romania: Casa Cărţii de Ştiinţă 2024 · Spain: Nordica Libros (Spanish only in Spain) 2022
Short Movies
Lisbon: Caminho 2011, 160 p.
Argentina: Interzona · Brazil: Dublinense 2015
Library (“Biblioteca”)
Porto: Campo das Letras 2004, 190 p.
Argentina: Letranómada 2009 · Brazil: Casa da Palavra 2009 · Spain: Xordica (Spanish only in Spain) 2007
PARTICIPATION IN ANTHOLOGIES
Europe City: Lessons from the European Prize for Urban Public Space
Epilogue by Zygmunt Baumann
Spain: Lars Müller 2015
Best European Fiction 2011
USA: Dalkey Archive Press 2010
POETRY
Geometrical Investigations (“Investigações Geométricas”)
Lisbon: Fundação Ciência e Desenvolvimento 2005, 151 p.
1 (Poetry) (“1 (Poesia)”)
Lisbon: Relógio d’Água 2004
Belgium: Atlas 2003 (anthology) · Brazil: Bertrand 2005 · Italy: Franco Puzzo 2008 · Luxembourg: CLAE/25A 2011 · Serbia: Treci Trg 2011 · Spain: Luces de Galibo 2012
Book of Dance (“Livro da Dança”)
Lisbon: Assírio & Alvim 2001, 137 p.
Argentina: Zindo & Gafuri 2017 · Brazil: Design 2008 · Hungary: Typotex 2019 · Spain: Kriller 71 2015
FOR YOUNG READERS
The Shoes. Stories by Mister Valéry (“Os Sapatos. Histórias do Senhor Valéry”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2009, 32 p.
English translation available
Brazil: Realejo · Hungary: Typotex 2019
The Holiday House. Stories by Mister Valéry (“A Casa de Férias. Histórias do Senhor Valéry”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2008, 32 p.
English and German translations available
Brazil: Realejo
The Two Sides. Stories by Mister Valéry (“Os Dois Lados. Histórias do Senhor Valéry”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2007, 25 p.
English and German translations available
Brazil: Realejo
The Friends. Stories by Mister Valéry (“Os Amigos. Histórias do Senhor Valéry”)
Lisbon: Caminho 2007, 25 p.
English and German translations available
Brazil: Realejo · Mexico: Ediciones SM 2014 · Panama: Piggy Press · Palestine: Palestina Writing · Spain: Onanda (Catalan)
