by José Saramago (Author)
What 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.
Format: Paperback
Pages: 320
Edition: Revised ed.
Publisher: Vintage Classics
Published: 01 Jun 2000
ISBN 10: 1860467229
ISBN 13: 9781860467226
Book Overview: A proofreader tinkering with a historical text opens up a world of ambiguity and invention, as he finds the relationship between fact and fiction to be far from clear.