La balsa de piedra

by José Saramago

La balsa de piedra es, en palabras del propio autor «una novela profundamente ibérica», relativa a «Portugal y al conjunto de los pueblos españoles, que siento que comparten una cultura común, una cultura que no es rigurosamente europea: es otro mundo, un mundo con un carácter tan fuerte, tan propio, que los pueblos de la Península deberían hacer un gran esfuerzo de entendimiento mutuo para resistir a las presiones de la cultura europea, que no es sino la cultura de los tres países dominantes, Francia, Alemania e Inglaterra.»
La maestría expresiva de José Saramago sirve, pues, aquí a un audaz planteamiento narrativo que, en la mejor tradición de Swift o de H.G. Wells, apunta al centro mismo de una verdadera «cuestión palpitante»: las relaciones de los pueblos ibéricos con Europa.

Genres: Fiction, Portugal, Magical Realism, Portuguese Literature, Literature, Nobel Prize, Novels

416 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1986

About the author

José de Sousa Saramago (16 November 1922 – 18 June 2010) was a Portuguese novelist and recipient of the 1998 Nobel Prize in Literature, for his "parables sustained by imagination, compassion and irony [with which he] continually enables us once again to apprehend an elusory reality." His works, some of which have been seen as allegories, commonly present subversive perspectives on historic events, emphasizing the theopoetic. In 2003 Harold Bloom described Saramago as "the most gifted novelist alive in the world today."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%...

Reviews

[Jim Fonseca · Rating 4 out of 5]

REVIEW CONTAIN SPOILERS

The scenario in The Stone Raft is that the Iberian Peninsula splits off at the Pyrenees and breaks away from France, drifting out into the Atlantic Ocean, headed for a collision with the Azores Islands. Like a good science fiction writer, the author gives us true details of how tectonic forces, like those that cause continental drift, might be at play and talks about scientifically correct information about how weather and climate might change.

The author gives us correct (but speculative) geopolitical information about how this might affect Spain and Portugal’s relationship to the European Union and how Portugal might become more tied to the the USA. “And it wasn’t from France that the peninsula broke away but from Europe, that may sound like the same thing but there’s a difference.”



We also read plausible scenarios of the behavior of people undergoing this geographic trauma. First the tourists panic and leave the peninsula, then the wealthy. People essentially abandon Portugal, especially Lisbon and Oporto, and move inland and into Spain as the Portuguese coast is expected to crash into the islands.

There are power shortages and gasoline shortages; people abandon cars. Poor folks occupy empty luxury hotels as squatters. People also empty out the from the easternmost islands of the Azores in anticipation of the collision.

Now the people part of the story: three men and two women, all initially strangers to each other, end up living together and traveling together fleeing northern Portugal. First they travel in a rat-trap old French Deux Chevaux, and then in a wagon pulled by two old horses (another Deux Chevaux!).



They are drawn to each other after being interviewed on television due to their strange stories related to the break-away of the now-island. Here’s the magical realism part: each of the characters had (or has) a unique experience in which they felt some agency for the breakaway. They feel that something they did was related to it or perhaps even caused it. I’ll put these in a spoiler even though we know all this pretty much at the start of the book: One man is followed by a flock of hundreds of starlings. Just prior to the break-up a young woman took a stick and drew a line in the dirt that can’t be erased. Another man was skipping stones at the seashore and suddenly acquired the strength of Hercules and threw a giant boulder a great distance.

In part the saga becomes a love story. The two women and two of the men pair off and become lovers. The odd man out befriends the dog. There’s a bit of a saga of the Old (American) West with their trials and tribulations in the covered wagon. The trip, a few miles a day with old horses, takes weeks. Sometimes they sleep in abandoned houses. They become peddlers of clothes to get money to survive. Much of the trip parallels the time-honored pilgrimage route, the Camino de Santiago, leading to the cathedral at Compostela.

It’s a story of interconnectedness – everything is interconnected whether we know it or not.

This question occurred to me while I was reading this book: Is Saramago, Portugal’s 1998 Nobel Prize winner, a science fiction writer? His work has been described as magical realism, fantasy, fantastic fiction -- why not science fiction? When I think of the three most recent works of his I have read, The Stone Raft, Death Interrupted and The Cave, I think all three qualify as science fiction. Death Interrupted is a realistic assessment of what would happen if people stopped dying. The Cave is set in futuristic dystopia.

We expect good writing from this Nobel Prize winner and we are not disappointed:

“…we still do not know what he looks like, this man appears to be hiding himself, but this is not the case, how often have we shown ourselves as we really are, and yet we need not have bothered, there was no one there to notice.”

“Bad example has always prospered and borne more fruit than good advice…”

“…and to think that there are people who do not believe in coincidences, when one is constantly discovering coincidences in the world and is beginning to wonder if coincidences are not the very logic of this world.”

“What a girl, Joana Carda smiled, I’m no girl, and I’m not the bitch you think I am, I don’t think you’re a bitch, Domineering, stubborn, conceited, affected, Good heavens, what a list, why not say mysterious and leave it at that…”

“I don’t have television, It was broadcast in the news bulletin, News is nothing but words, and you can never really tell if words are news.”

“I was worn out, and if a woman remarries at my age, it’s on account of any land she may own, men are more interested in marrying land than a woman…”

“Pedro Orce, who is old and already bearing the first sign of death, which is solitude…”

“But no one would forgive a government for abandoning a city as beautiful as this one [Lisbon], perfect in its proportions and harmony, as will inevitably be said of it once the city has been destroyed.”



As you can tell for the quotes above, the author often uses long paragraphs with thoughts and dialog separated only by commas. A good story with great writing, perhaps a bit dragged out and slow in places.

Saramago is one of my favorite authors and I have read seven or eight of his novels. Below are links to my reviews of other novels of his:

Blindness

The Double

All the Names

The Lizard - a children’s book

Death with Interruptions

The Cave

Cain

Raised from the Ground

The Tale of the Unknown Island – short story

Top photo - rural northern Portugal (near Chaves, birthplace of my grandmother) from portugalbike.com
Map of the Iberian peninsula from pixers.pics
The author from agendalx.pt

[Luís · Rating 4 out of 5]

The same year Portugal and Spain joined the European Union, José Saramago envisioned the physical and geographical detachment of the Iberian Peninsula from the continent. It might sound like a pamphlet denouncing Europe's new stranglehold on the sovereignty and integrity of these two nations, which have flourishing histories. However, the story tends more towards farce, and this is not surprising when we learn about the taste of the Portuguese novelist's joke.
This fact describes the wanderings of five individuals and a dog on a peninsula adrift between Europe and the Americas. Nothing seems to link these characters except their sexual nature, male and female, and their vague common experience of singular telluric signs. They will try to agree on the limited resources at their disposal, but will also unite in the event of an immediate emergency.
We don't believe in this geological accident story, but that's not what matters. Saramago successfully conveys his love of words to us, and we feel his pleasure in sharing a collective adventure that fosters growth through his profound respect for human nature.

[BlackOxford · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brexit Forefelt

Spain and Portugal float away from Europe as a disunited kingdom, leaving Gibraltar behind, a lonely Atlantic island. Written in 1986 about the Iberian leave-taking from continental Europe, The Stone Raft is the perfect book for Brexit 2016. A cliché, I know, but not an un-useful one.


Separation from the rest of Europe is just not easy emotionally for either party. "A loving mother, Europe was saddened by the misfortune of her lands on the extreme west." All sorts of connections - journalistic as well as legal and physical (particularly electricity) - have to be worked out, as any country with experience would know. And, with Saramago, Portugal has that experience and can share it with Britain.

Apologies by those departing are of course necessary, along the lines of 'it's not anything about you, it's us'. So in their letters home, the inveterate exiteers write "...that their world had changed, and their way of life, they were not to blame, on the whole they were people with little willpower, the sort of people who could not make up their mind..." No fault international divorce.

Even in translation one has often to voice Saramago's prose in order to get the sense of it much less enjoy its full effects. It is a form of written/oral story-telling that has an essential musicality which is as much a part of the tale as its subtle humour and irony. It is also lots of fun. The characters and cadence could be from The Canterbury Tales:

"So let is not ask Jose Anaico who he is and what he does for a living, where he comes from and where he is going, whatever we find out about him, we shall only find out from him, and this description, this sketchy information will also have to serve for Joana Carda and her elm branch, for Joaquim Sassa and the stone he threw into the sea, for Pedro Orce and the chair he got up from, life does not begin when people are born, if it were so, each day would be a day gained, life begins much later, and how often too late, not to mention those lives that have no sooner begun than they are over, which has led one Piet to exclaim, Ah, who will write the history of what might have been."


I am particularly fond of Saramago's alternative Cartesianism: "...the only great truth is that the world cannot die." Quem mundus non potest mori, perhaps, as a replacement for the Cogito ergo sum. Not that it has the same epistemological pretensions as the Cogito, of course, but " ...in the absence of any certainties one has to pretend." Indeed, pretending to leave the EU may be Britain's salvation as well.

[Kalliope · Rating 5 out of 5]

As I was getting ready to travel around the Iberian Peninsula and fly to Porto, I pulled out this book detaching it from the bookshelves to which it belonged. Since it had been in my shelves for quite a few years, I dreaded that in its immobility it had petrified and that it had lost its nature as a book. But no, there it was, flexible as a thin stack of paper, and with the pages printed, ready for my eyes to scan its graphics. And ready for travel too.

Saramago’s novel chronicles how the Iberian Peninsula, by detaching itself from the European continent along the middle of the Pyrenees departed on a journey, and narrates the wandering of a few Iberian individuals--both Portuguese and Spanish, around the floating Peninsula, no longer a geographic entity, but a huge stone floating and mobile raft.

These individuals have been united in their shared perplexity at the extraordinary phenomenon, and by their suspicion that they are jointly but independently responsible, and in a most esoteric chain of eccentric causality, for the detachment of their countries from Europe.

My edition is in Portuguese, although I had borrowed a Spanish version to keep on the side and help me in case I felt I was drowning in Portuguese (afogar – ahogar). But no, I floated in Portuguese (flutuar – flotar) and I enjoyed the different waters – less salty. And this wavering between the two languages was suitable, since Saramago, who obviously wrote it in his language, had settled in Spain (in Tenerife, one of the Canary islands). The book has many references and comparisons between the two languages using Spanish ones whenever he thinks they are more suitable, and Saramago rings the echoes of various Spanish and Portuguese literary figures. The wandering chevaliers are literary heirs of Don Quixote, and the featured donkey can only be named Platero Platero and I, and the characters have expressed concern about where Antonio Machado was buried. And of course there is Pessoa's shadow.

Saramago was of the opinion that the two countries should be united and this was written when they entered the EEC on Janurary 1st, 1986. And that is the year when this novel was written.

In his delightful and inimitable style Saramago concocts his idiosyncratic mixture of the absurd and the common sense. With his pen the absurd becomes common and the common sense has an absurd tone to it. What he calls the Insólito and the Sólito (and the latter is an invented word, and so his comparison becomes more goofy). This is Saramago’s stamp.

Saramago, together with the story of his quixotic and diverse wanderers of this floating raft—which, in contrast to Odysseus, moves away from home rather than towards it, and in so doing distances itself from the Mediterranean as it advances West onto the Atlantic--, has also developed a parallel story-line with the geopolitical implications on an international scale. The balance of powers is dislocated as this floating island moves towards the Americas and Lisbon is getting ready to become a facing neighbor to Atlantic City. What are the responses of the other Europeans; what happens with Gibraltar; how the tensions between Canada and the US increase as the latter seems to be calling the shots in the new North-Atlantic allegiance... Or once it seems the stone raft is heading South, the concern of the US President with their missiles grounded in Iberia and whether they will have to deploy them against the penguins...And a long and rich and entertaining etcetera.

But with all the wit, and the humour, and the irony and the absurdity, there is also a loving tone when addressing cherished human subjects, such as love, companionship and loyalty.

And beneath all this absurdity on a geographical, political, personal level, there is the understated question of the nature of identity.

And in this Saramago remains provocative. But that could be another review.

------


I dedicate this review to the citizens of Greece, hoping that they will not detach themselves from Europe.

[BookHunter M ُH َM َD · Rating 3 out of 5]

انضمت كل من اسبانيا و البرتغال إلى الإتحاد الأوروبي في موجة توسعاته الثانية في منتصف الثمانينيات من القرن الماضي. كان ذلك حدثا استثنائيا رافقه صخب شديد و موجات من النقاشات الأوروبية حول جدوى تلك الخطوة. ذلك أن الأوروبيين طالما اعتبروا أن الحدود الأوروبية الغربية تتوقف عند جبال البرانس التي تفصل فرنسا عن شبه جزيرة أيبريا التي تضم الدولتين محل الحديث.

من هنا جاءت الفكرة لساراماجو. ماذا لو انفصلت شبه الجزيرة عن أوروبا. لفظ الإنفصال هنا لا يعني عدم الإنضمام و لكن يعني كل ما يجب أن يعنيه. ستنشق الأرض من ناحية جبال البرانس و تنفصل الكتلة الأرضية التي تحمل الدولتان عن أوروبا تماما مخلفة شقا طوليا في الأرض كالإخدود العظيم الذي ما يلبث أن يتسع لتبتعد شبه الجزيرة تماما مبحرة في المحيط لا تلوي على شيء تاركة هذا الجدل الأوروبي حول انضمامها من عدمه ليصير بلا معنى.

إن كوكبا يدور حول نجم بهذه الطريقة. يدور. و يدور. الآن ليل. و الآن نهار. الآن برد. و الآن حر. و فضاء يكاد يكون خاليا حيث لا توجد أشياء ضخمة لا اسم لها غير الأسماء التي نطلقها عليها. و زمن لا يعرف أحد حقيقة ما هو. كل هذا يجب أن يكون من فعل مجانين.

و لأن ساراماجو من زمرة المجانين فقد كتب لنا هذه الرواية المجنونة التي تهنا فيها مع الجزيرة السابحة في الماء كحاملة طائرات ضخمة تهيم على وجهها في المحيط بلا دفة و لا ربّان فجاءت بداية الرواية و حتى ما يقارب الثلث الأول منها بلا ترابط واضح بينما جاءت باقي الأحداث تحمل الكثير من الثرثرة و التفاصيل التي لا تعني إلا المواطن الأوروبي الملم بتاريخ و جغرافية هذا الجزء من العالم.
من المفارقات اللافتة أن السيارة التي حملتهم في بداية الرحلة كانت سيارة صغيرة ذات اسطوانتان لذا فقد سماها ذات الحصانين إلى أن استبدلوها بعد ذلك عندما زاد عددهم و قلت مواردهم بعربة يجرها حصانين حقيقيين في إشارة إلى أن شبه الجزيرة لن ينصلح حالها و لن تقو على المسير إلا بدولتيها و شعبيها جميعا بتنوعهم و ثرائهم و اختلافهم و كذلك أوروبا.

الرواية بالطبع ملهمة و قيمة و ان انتابني بعض الملل اثناء القراءة لأنها كانت مغرقة في المحلية أحيانا إلا أنها كانت ممتعة و تستحق القراءة.

[Sawsan · Rating 3 out of 5]

أفكار روايات ساراماجو متفردة حتى ولو السرد متفاوت
الرواية تقوم على حدث عجيب بأثر توليفة غرائبية من أفعال بسيطة لشخصيات مختلفة
تبدأ عندما يرمي رجل في البرتغال بحجر في مياه المحيط فيشعر رجل في أسبانيا باهتزاز الأرض
تنشق جبال البرانس وتنفصل شبه الجزيرة الأيبيرية عن أوربا وتطفو عائمة في المحيط
يصف ساراماجو تبعات الانفصال الدولية والمحلية وأحداث الفوضى والشغب في وقت الأزمات
غالبا ما ينجو أصحاب الثروات والسلطة بينما تحاول الطبقات الأخرى التعايش بسلوكيات مختلفة
في هذه الأجواء يجتمع ثلاثة رجال وامرأتين في رحلة على الجزيرة العائمة ما بين البرتغال وأسبانيا
رحلة تضامن ورفقة وحب..وتبقى النهاية غامضة بدون تفسير لفرضيات الخيال التي تُصور الواقع

[Hugh · Rating 4 out of 5]

This early novel can be seen as the precursor or model for Saramago's later surreal modern parables Blindness, Seeing, and Death at Intervals, all of which explore the consequences of changing one of the natural laws society takes for granted. It has a similar mixture of philosophy, humour and the political and personal. As in all of his novels, Saramago's style is idiosyncratic, with long and apparently rambling sentences broken only by occasional commas.

This time the starting point occurs when a crack opens up along the French border in the Pyrenees, and the Iberian peninsula starts moving into the Atlantic towards the Azores. The first section brings together a group of people all of whom have been touched by apparently miraculous events at the same time as the gap appeared. This personal story, which has elements of the picaresque, is set against a wider imagining of the political, geographical and social consequences of such an upheaval. Once again Saramago places little faith in the governments he portrays, and his imagination spans both big ideas and quotidian details.

The oddly assorted group of three men, two women (three Portuguese and two Spanish) and a dog travel round the new island on a desultory quest, initially by car and later in a horse drawn wagon (both Deux Chevaux). To say much more would spoil the book for new readers, and this one stands comparison with Saramago's best books.

[Mark André · Rating 4 out of 5]

A pleasant life affirming read. Typical Saramago: a cataclysmic event, characters must cope, some philosophy, some foibles, some romance, a sagacious dog. We are a part of nature: the process of renewal. What’s the book about? Geography.

[Amira Mahmoud · Rating 3 out of 5]

"
مكتوب في القدر، عندما تنبح الكلاب ينتهي العالم
"

من روى حكاية، إذا لم يروِ أخرى فهذا علامة سيئة
"

كم مرة علمتنا تجارب الحياة أنه لا يجب علينا أن نحكم على المظاهر
"

هذا العالم، ولن نتعب من تكراره، عبارة عن كوميديا من الأكاذيب.
"

في الفنون المختلفة وبشكل خاص فن الكتابة، فإن أفضل الطرق بين نقطتين، وإن كانت قريبتين لم يكن أبدًا ولن يكون مطلقًا الخط الذي يسمونه مستقيمًا، أبدًا ومطلقًا، طريقة حازمة للإجابة عن الشكوك بإسكاتها.
"

إن كوكبًا يدور حول نجم بهذه الطريقة، يدور ويدور، الآن ليل والآن نهار، الآن برد والآن حر، وفضاء يكاد يكون خاليًا حيث لا توجد أشياء ضخمة لا اسم لها إلا الأسماء التي نطلقها عليها، وزمن لا يعرف أحد حقيقة ما هو، كل هذا يجب أن يكون من فعل المجانين!
"

الحياة مليئة بأحداث صغيرة تبدو قليلة الأهمية، وأخر تحتل في لحظة معينة مجال الاهتمام، وفيما بعد نقوم بتحليلها على ضوء نتائجها، ومن الممكن أن تنتهي بعض تلك الأشياء التي احتلت أحداثًا مهمة أو على الأقل كحلقة تربط ما بين مجموعة من الأحداث المتوالية والمهمة.
"

وإذا لم يكن عاشقًا لأسباب مفهومة بحكم الطبيعة، فالصداقة أفضل تعويض.
"

ليس هناك شيء يغيّر وجه الأشياء مثل ضوء النهار.
"

عندما يأتي يوم نهاية العالم، سننظر إلى آخر نملة بالصمت المؤلم لمن يعرف أنه يودع للأبد!
"

اليأس كما نعرف جميعًا، سلوك بشري، لا نعرف خلال التاريخ الطبيعي أن الحيوانات تيأس. لكن الإنسان نفسه لا ينفصم عن اليأس، اعتاد على الحياة فيه ويحتمله حتى آخر الحدود.
"

إلا أن الاختصار ليس فضيلة كاملة ولكن الإسهاب قد يؤدي إلى الإرباك والحيرة، هذا حقيقي إلا أنه م من مرة ربحنا بالكلام أكثر مما هو مطلوب.
"

ولكن ليّ رغبة في أن أقول أن القلة من الناس الذين ماتوا في الحروب القديمة لهم قيمة أكبر في التاريخ من مئات الآلاف والملايين الذين يسقطون في القرن الحاضر.
"

ما لا نراه نسميه الله!
"

الإنسان كائن ذكي، لا شك في هذا ولكن ليس إلى الدرجة المطلوبة، وهذا إثبات واعتراف بالتواضع الذي يجب أن نواجه به أنفسنا أولاً قبل أن يواجهونا به، تمامًا كما هو البِر بمفهومه الحقيقي.
"

تشبه العمى كثيرًا، إلا أن الكارثة في العمى كانت وباء يمكن وصفه وتخيله
بينما ها هنا الكارثة جغرافية، لن تستطيع تخيلها مهما اجتهد الكاتب في الوصف
خاصة وأنها بقعة لا تنتمي لها مطلقًا!
العمى رغم لا منطقيتها لكنها مستساغة ومفهومة
بينما الطوف الحجري عبثية بشكل عصيّ على الفهم
لم استمتع بشيء ها هنا، بقدر استمتاعي بأسلوب سارماجو المعتاد في السرد
ربما سأعود لها فيما بعد..

تمّت

[°°°·.°·..·°¯°·._.· ʜᴇʟᴇɴ Ροζουλί Εωσφόρος ·._.·°¯°·.·° .·°°° ★·.·´¯`·.·★ Ⓥⓔⓡⓝⓤⓢ Ⓟⓞⓡⓣⓘⓣⓞⓡ Ⓐⓡⓒⓐⓝⓤⓢ Ταμετούρο Αμ · Rating 5 out of 5]

«Το μέλλον είναι πάντα μυθικό»

Οι ζωές δεν αρχίζουν με τη γέννηση των ανθρώπων,
αν ήταν έτσι, κάθε μέρα, θα’ταν μια μέρα κερδισμένη.
Οι ζωές ξεκινούν αργότερα, μερικές φορές μάλιστα
πολύ αργότερα, για να μην πούμε και για εκείνες
που μόλις αρχίσουν έχουν κιόλας τελειώσει,
γι’αυτό και κάποιος φώναξε:
Αχ, ποιος θα γράψει την ιστορία αυτού που θα μπορούσε να’χε γίνει.


Όταν μια ανατριχίλα φόβου διατρέχει την ανθρωπότητα σαν απο συμπόνοια ο ένας άνθρωπος ψιθυρίζει ουρλιάζοντας στον άλλον, ήταν γραφτό.
Ήταν γραφτό, τι, που, δεν ξέρουμε απο που αντλεί
το γόητρο της η φράση και κατέχει την πρώτη θέση στην γραμματική τ��υ μοιραίου ύφους.
Μα οι λέξεις, αυτές που τις φτιάξαμε εμείς,
έχουν αυτό το καλό, βοηθούν,
και μόνο που τις λέμε με υπερβολή
ανακουφίζουν την τρομάρα και τα πάθη, διότι, τα εκδραματίζουν.

Και κάπως έτσι όταν τα ανεξήγητα ή τα παρεξηγημένα πλήττουν την ανθρώπινη φύση και την ισορροπία που τεκμαίρεται απο αίτια και αιτιατά, με επισταμένη περίσκεψη και πάντα με σεβασμό στην κοινή λογική, στον ορθό λόγο και στην χρήση παρομοιώσεων που πρέπει να γίνονται επικίνδυνες όταν τις παίρνουνε κατά γράμμα, αν δεν μάθουμε πρώτα να δείχνουμε σύνεση.

Είναι πασιφανές και αδιαμφισβήτητο πως απο το αδιέξοδο κανείς δεν βγαίνει στην πλατεία.

Όταν συμβαίνουν μοιραία γεγονότα στην ιστορία της ανθρωπότητας, όταν τα μεγάλα πνεύματα προσπαθούν να εξηγήσουν με περιέργεια και σκεπτικισμό την αιτία των πολλών ή των λιγοστών σοβαρών και διαφορετικών αποτελεσμάτων ώστε σε κάποιο ευλογοφανή σημείο
της μοίρας θα πούμε με λέξεις δεσμευτικές τα αναπόδραστα και τα ανεπιστρεπτί, τη δυσκολία να κατανοήσουμε πως σε οποιαδήποτε στιγμή της ζωής μας, αν θα υπάρξει ποτέ αυτή η στιγμή, θα ξεδιαλύνουμε τελικά την αλήθεια απο τη φαντασία.
Σε τέτοιες τραγικές στιγμές που μαζεύονται οι κατάρες των λοιμών και των σεισμών σε ένα πανδαιμόνιο,
οι διάβολοι κάνουν πανηγύρι και οι μάγισσες έχουν σύναξη, για να επιδράσουν πιο έντονα στο ηθικό των ανθρώπων, αναλόγως της τιμής και της θρησκείας που επαγγέλλονται.

Κι έτσι ξαφνικά κι αναπάντεχα ή προφανώς αναμενόμενα η γη η ίδια είναι νεκρή.
Τι νόημα έχει να μιλάμε Γι αυτούς που πέθαναν
πριν απο χρόνια,
ποιος ο λόγος του φόβου μπροστά στον θάνατο
όταν η νεκρή γη είναι θαμμένη μέσα
στον ίδιο τον εαυτό της.

«Η πέτρινη σχεδία» είναι ένα μαγικό μυθιστόρημα ισχυρής φαντασίας.
Η παντοδυναμία της φύσης ως ανεξήγητο φαινόμενο χωρίζεται απο κάθε ανθρωπομορφικό στοιχείο και εξουσιάζει κάθε μορφή ζωής.

Η εξουσία της ανθρώπινης ματαιοδοξίας που προσπαθεί να δείξει στους τυφλούς και να κηρύξει στους κωφούς την πέτρινη καρδιά της.

Όλα τα πράγματα που περιγράφει συγκεκριμένα ο συγγραφέας σε αυτό το βιβλίο αναφέρονται στο πρώτο και το δεύτερο κεφάλαιο.
Μια δύσκολη ιδέα παράδοξης κοσμοθεωρίας και γεωφυσικών φαινομένων που συγκεντρωμένα
σε ένα και μόνο γεγονός,
αλλάζουν δραματικά ολόκληρο τον κόσμο.

Μια τέτοια ιδέα ρεαλιστικής δυστοπίας μέσα σε φανταστικό πλαίσιο δύσκολα χτίζεται και δημιουργείται απο πολλούς και διάφορους συγγραφείς ανεξαρτήτως εποχής.
Οι περισσότεροι τραβάνε την ιστορία απο τα μαλλιά
του εντυπωσιασμού και ξεφεύγουν απο την ουσία ή αντιγράφουν παλιές επαναλήψεις ηθικής, τρόμου, και άπλετου συναισθηματισμού.

Ο Τιτάνας της λογοτεχνίας, ο αυτοδίδακτος σοφός της παγκόσμιας πεζογραφίας, γράφει πράγματι μια ιστορία φανταστικού περιεχομένου, μα, παίζει με άπειρους τρόπους συλλογιστικής και ερμηνείας έτσι ώστε η φαντασίωση του να βασίζεται στον πραγματικό κόσμο.

Τούτο, δεν είναι σίγουρα, ένα βιβλίο που μπορεί να καταβροχθιστεί γρήγορα ακόμη και απο τους πιο δεινούς αναγνώστες.
Θέλει συγκέντρωση και επανάληψη σε αρκετά απο τα χωρία του για να σου δώσει την αξία της σημασίας ίσως μιας και μόνο φράσης : < Είμαστε όλοι Ίβηρες»,
ειπωμένη σε ολες τις γλώσσες της οικουμένης.

Γενικά τα έργα του άθεου θεού Ζοζέ Σαραμάγκου
δεν είναι δροσερές και ελαφριές απολαύσεις
νυχτερινής ψυχαγωγίας.
Κόντρα στους σύγχρονους γραφιάδες και τις τυπικές συγγραφικές συμβάσεις ο Σαραμάγκου με ευφυΐα
και ταλέντο απάλευτο, εναποθέτει μεγάλο μέρος του βάρους στον αναγνώστη ώστε να προσαρμοστεί στο ύφος του γραψίματος.

Χτίζει απερίσπαστος ένα κατασκεύασμα απο πολύτιμους λίθους κάποιου μεγαλειώδους πνευματικού θησαυρού που βρίσκεται θαμμένος στην ανθρώπινη βιοτεχνία σκέψης που φυτεύει σπόρους σοφίας, ιστορίας, φιλοσοφίας, λαϊκής ετυμηγορίας πολιτικών σχολίων και αξεπέραστο χιούμορ ως αντιδιαβρωτικό στην φθορά της τυποποίησης.

Μια γραμμή που χαράσσεται στο χώμα παντοτινά,
ένας σκυλάκος, γνήσια απόγονος του Κέρβερου
που δεν γαυγίζει ποτέ μα οδηγεί σαν ιχνηλάτης στο ανεξήγητο.
Ένα κοπάδι απο χιλιάδες ψαρόνια που ακολουθούν κάποιον.
Η γη τρέμει και συνταράσσεται μόνο στην αντιληπτική μαι αισθητική ικανότητα που νιώθει κάτω απο τα πόδια του ένας άνδρας.
Μια πέτρα που ρίχτηκε στη θάλασσα σε απόσταση αντιστρόφως ανάλογη του βάρους της.
Μια χερσόνησος που ξαφνικά και ανεξήγητα γίνεται νησί.
Ένα μάλλινο θαλασσί πουγκί που ξηλώνεται φτιάχνοντας το κουβάρι της οικουμένης.

Πως συνδέονται όλα αυτά, δεν πρόκειται
να εξηγηθεί σε καμία περίπτωση διαβάζοντας την
«πέτρινη σχεδία», αυτή δίνει απλόχερα κάθε είδους υλικό πνευματικής ενάργειας και τροφής του μυαλού
για να απαντηθούν τα ερωτήματα για τον καθένα ξεχωριστά.
Ένας καθρέφτης σπασμένος σε κομμάτια,
όσο ενώνουμε τα κομμάτια τόσο περισσότερο αντικτοπτρίζεται μέσα του το είδωλο του ίδιου μας του εαυτού.

Η αφήγηση της συγκεκριμένης ιστορίας αλλάζει κυριολεκτικά τον κόσμο και πείθει με ακλόνητα επιχειρήματα πως ακόμη κι αν το ταξίδι της ζωής μου
με οδηγεί σε κάποιο αστέρι, αυτό, δε σημαίνει απαραιτήτως πως απαιτείται να ταξιδεύω στους δρόμους αυτής της γης.

🖤🖤💟💟🖤🖤

Καλή ανάγνωση.
Πολλούς ασπασμούς.

[crίѕтίŋα•●Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ●• · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars

Two moths ago (on vacation) I bought "the stone raft" (a jangada de pedra) by José Saramago [nobel prize in literature (1998)] in one of the most beautiful bookstores in the world, "Livraria Lello" in Porto, Portugal (my country). This somptuous bookshop inspired the Harry Potter’s library in Hogwarts. In fact, J.K Rowling lived in Porto teaching English in the early 1990s.
If you ever come to Portugal you should visit it ....... just saying... ♥️
#PortugueseAuthor

"Dificílimo acto é o de escrever, responsabilidade das maiores, basta pensar no extenuante trabalho que será dispor por ordem temporal os acontecimentos, primeiro este, depois aquele, ou, se tal mais convém às necessidades do efeito, o sucesso de hoje posto antes do episódio de ontem, e outras não menos arriscadas acrobacias, o passado como se tivesse sido agora, o presente como um contínuo sem princípio nem fim, mas, por muito que se esforcem os autores, uma habilidade não podem cometer, pôr por escrito, no mesmo tempo, dois casos no mesmo tempo acontecidos."
*
“Writing is extremely difficult, it is an enormous responsibility, you need only think of the exhausting work involved in setting out events in chronological order, first this one, then that, or, if more conducive to the desired effect, today's event before yesterday's episode, and other no less risky acrobatics, presenting the past as if it were something new, or the present as a continuous process with neither beginning nor end, but, however hard writers might try, there is one feat they cannot achieve, and that is to put into writing, in the same tense, two events that have occurred simultaneously.”
- José Saramago

* * *
"Mas é verdade que há diferenças de mundo para mundo, toda a gente sabe que em Marte os homens são verdes, enquanto na terra os há de todas as cores, excepto essa."
*
“But it is true that there are differences between one world and another, everybody knows that on Mars the inhabitants are green, while here on earth they are every color except green.”
- José Saramago

* * *
"O certo gera o errado, o errado produz o certo, Fraca consolação para um aflito, Não há consolação, amigo triste, o homem é um animal inconsolável."
*
“Right engenders wrong, wrong produces right, Poor consolation for a man in distress, There is no consolation, I'm afraid, man is a creature beyond consoling.”
- José Saramago

* * *
"Quantas vezes, para mudar a vida, precisamos da vida inteira, pensamos tanto, tomamos balanço e hesitamos, depois voltamos ao princípio, tornamos a pensar e a pensar, deslocamos-nos nas calhas do tempo com um movimento circular, como os espojinhos que atravessam o campo levantando poeira, folhas secas, insignificâncias, que para mais não lhes chegam as forças, bem melhor seria vivermos em terras de tufões."
*
“So often we need a whole lifetime in order to change our life, we think a great deal, weigh things up and vacillate, then we go back to the beginning, we think and think, we displace ourselves on the tracks of time with a circular movement, like those clouds of dust, dead leaves, debris, that have no strength for anything more, better by far that we should live in a land of hurricanes.”
- José Saramago

* * *
A vida está cheia de pequenos acontecimentos que parecem ter pouca importância, outros há que num certo momento ocuparam a atenção toda, e quando mais tarde, à luz das suas consequências, os reapreciamos, vê-se que destes esmoreceu a lembrança, ao passo que aqueles ganharam título de facto decisivo ou, pelo menos, malha de ligação de uma cadeia sucessiva e significativa de eventos."
*
“Life is full of little episodes that seem unimportant, while others at a certain moment absorb all our attention, when we reappraise them later, in the light of their consequences, we find that our memory of the latter has faded while the former have come to seem decisive or, at least, a link in a chain of successive and meaningful events.”
- José Saramago

* * *
"Se uma pessoa, para gostar doutra, estivesse à espera de conhecê-la, não lhe chegaria a vida inteira.
*
“If one couldn't like another person before getting to know him, it would take a lifetime.”
- Joana Carda

* * *
"Cãozinho bonito, se fores capaz de tratar de nós como pareces saber tratar de ti, estamos bem entregues à tua canina competência."
*
“Good dog, if you're as capable of looking after us as you are of looking after yourself, you'll do a good job of protecting us.”
- Joaquim Sassa

* * *
"Este homem que dorme lançou um rochedo ao mar, e Joana Carda cortou o chão em dois, e José Anaiço foi o rei dos estorninhos, e Pedro Orce faz tremer a terra com os pés e o Cão veio não se sabe de onde para juntar estas pessoas."
*
“This man sleeping beside her threw a stone into the sea, and Joana Carda cut the earth in two, and José Anaiço became the king of starlings, and Pedro Orce can cause the earth to tremble with his feet, and the Dog has come from who knows where to bring these people together.”
- Maria Guavaira

* * *
"Na nossa vida nunca roubamos nada, é sempre na vida dos outros."
*
“We've never stolen anything in our life, it's always in the life of others”
- Pedro Orce

* * *
"É muito bonita a tua atitude, mas a nossa preocupação não deverá ser dividir a pobreza, mas sim aumentar a riqueza."
*
“That's a kind thought but our main concern should be to share wealth instead of poverty.”
- José Anaiço

[Karen·]

Mr. Saramago came to call - well I mean I invited him in - he doesn't just turn up on your doorstep uninvited that would be rude, wouldn't it, well, maybe not rude but discourteous and my impression of him is that he would never be knowingly discourteous, I don't think it's in his nature, which seems to me to be warm, like that lovely feeling you get when you've had a glass of something stronger, there's that warm glow that starts somewhere inside and spreads until it reaches your face and puts a smile on the same, but anyway where was I again, ah yes, Mr. Saramago and of course I asked him in, wouldn't you do the same, because there's a guarantee with him that something good will happen somehow, it doesn't always look that way to start with and sometimes things can get very disturbing, but then it all steps just very slightly outside the realm of reality which is kind of wondrous, sort of mind expanding, the idea of being followed by a flock of starlings, see I think I'd like that although starlings are not really my favourite bird, so noisy, but even if I don't get to choose the kind of bird that would be magnificent to have my own personal flock of birds, and really it would have to be something raucous and sociable because other birds don't flock, so I'd take starlings, yes, or the ability to draw a line in the sand that always reappears no matter how often or hard you try to rub it out or ride in a car that is almost human and whose name is Deux Chevaux, not the brand name now, I mean that is what it is called in the same way as a character might be Jose or Pedro, and those who are called Jose or Pedro are as courteous to the feelings of Deux Chevaux as they are to each other and this makes it all sound a bit fey and unreal, but it's not I assure you it's not, the people do have to make ordinary every day practical decisions that require logical thinking and a discussion of how best to go about this and they do it calmly and without shouting or screaming at each other and it all seems quite sensible even though the situation is crazy mad with the Iberian peninsula zooming westward and a dog that leads Deux Chevaux to where it needs to go in order to deliver the passengers to the place they need to be and to carry out the task they need to do which all seems fitting and right as if this was always how it was meant to be, preordained years before so that they would be here, now, where they are the ones to do this. To bury Pedro Orce.
Oh, and the Peninsula does come to a halt. In case you wondered.

[Ahmed · Rating 4 out of 5]

أنا بحب النوعية دي من الرويات , النوعية المتشائمة السوداوية الكئيبة , اللى بتكون أقرب للواقعية من أي شئ آخر , فالواقع سخيف لن تقدر على التعبير عنه إلا من خلال كتابة سوداوية تواجه ذلك السخف.

الرواية عبارة عن مجموعة من المصائب , مصيبة إثر كارثة وهكذا , فتجد أن الرواية في النهاية مآساة إغريقية جديرة بالتسجيل.

وتسجيل الكاتب لتلك الأحداث كان في غاية الظرف , تسجيل سلس مؤثر حقيقي للغاية .

ويبدو أن الكاتب قد بذل مجهود جبار لكي يخرج لنا مثل هذا العمل ففي النهاية يرى الكاتب أن :

(الكتابة عملية صعبة للغاية , إنها من المسئوليات الكبرى , يكفي التفكير في العمل الشاق الذي يحتاجه الترتيب الزمني للأحداث , أولًا هذا , وبعده ذاك , أو , لو كان متوافقًا مع الفعل المطلوب , فحدث اليوم موضوع قبل فصل الأمس , وألعاب أخرى ليست أقل خطورة , كتابة الماضي كما لو كان يحدث الآن , والحاضر كما لو كان مستمرًا بلا نهاية , لكن مهما بذل المؤلفون من جهد , هناك قدرة لا يمكنهم إعلانها , أن يضعوا في وقت واحد شيئين وقعا في ذات الوقت . )

وقد برع في ذلك للغاية , فالأحداث متداخلة بصورة مكثفة ولكنه متقنة , الكاتب يمسك بخيوط عمله بابداع .

العمل معقد عميق , تتداخل فيه الشخصيات مع الأحداث مع براعة الوصف لينتج لنا عمل مميز للغاية.

لقاء آخر مميز مع الساحر البرتغالي .

[diario_de_um_leitor_pjv · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reler este livro 27 anos depois foi sui generis. Durante muitos anos este foi o meu Saramago preferido mas "Levantado do Chão" entrou de rompante para o primeiro lugar do pódio.

Mas continua a ser uma obra magistral e um dos meus livros preferidos de Saramago. O carácter eminentemente geográfico do livro, a sua desconstrução de mitos e discursos sobre a Europa, a Península e a Portugalidade tornam esta obra num livro que me encanta e com o qual, criticamente, aprendo.

Esta leitura decorreu grande parte dela no voo entre Lisboa e Nova Iorque, na estada nesta cidade e na viagem de comboio entre esta e Boston.

#livro #literatura #leitor #leitores #leitura #literaturaportuguesa #Saramago #lerosnobel #nobel #nobeldaliteratura

[Joy D · Rating 4 out of 5]

This has to be one of the most unusual and creative books I have ever read. The Iberian Peninsula breaks off from Europe and becomes a traveling island. It threatens to crash into the Azores. The storyline focuses on three men and two women that feel a sense of responsibility, expressed in terms of magical realism, for the breakaway. They are joined by a dog and two horses. They travel around Spain and Portugal, witnessing the responses to this unexpected event.

Saramago examines the social and geopolitical ramifications of profound change, while inserting a good dose of dry humor, especially with regard to how governments (Spain, Portugal, France, US, Russia) respond to the crisis. It is written in a literary style, with Saramago’s standard long sentences and embedded dialogue. I am not sure I took away all the author intended, but I did find thought-provoking observations about the roles of coincidence and interconnectedness in life.

Memorable passages:
“Life is full of little episodes that seem unimportant, while others at a certain moment absorb all our attention, when we reappraise them later, in the light of their consequences, we find that our memory of the latter has faded while the former have come to seem decisive or, at least, a link in a chain of successive and meaningful events…”

“No journey is but one journey, each journey comprises a number of journeys, and if one of them seems so meaningless that we have no hesitation in saying it was not worthwhile, our common sense, were it not so often clouded by prejudice and idleness, would tell us that we should verify whether the journeys within that journey were not of sufficient value to have justified all the trials and tribulations.”

[A. Raca · Rating 4 out of 5]

Her Saramago okuduğumda şaşırıyorum.
Bu kez Iber Yarımadası anakaradan bir şekilde kopuyor ve kaos çıkıyor. Ada kendi halinde yüzerken devletin içinde olduğu gibi bireyin içindeki kaosu da görüyoruz.

Saramago bu kez paragraf ve noktalama koymuş, bu da şaşırtıcı.

"Yaşam önemsiz görünen küçük olaylarla doludur, diğerleriyse belli bir anda tüm dikkatimizi üzerlerine çekmiştir."

[None Ofyourbusiness Loves Israel · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Iberian peninsula decides it has had quite enough of being attached to the rest of Europe, thank you very much. It cracks loose like a giant stone raft that forgot its anchor, and begins drifting into the Atlantic with the calm entitlement of a continent that has already paid its dues to history. This is the sort of thing continents do when they get bored.

Scientists lose their minds, politicians lose their tempers, and tourists lose their luggage. Everyone else loses the plot, except for a handful of oddballs who, miraculously, seem to be connected to the whole geological tantrum.

Five strangers discover that very normal moments in their lives have triggered very abnormal consequences. A woman draws a line in the dirt. A man throws a stone with suspicious athleticism. Another hears the ground tremble only through his soles as if the planet has decided to communicate directly with his socks. A flock of starlings appoints a fellow as their reluctant messiah. A woman pulls a thread from a sock that behaves like it has reached an agreement with infinity. It is all wonderfully stupid and strangely meaningful. Naturally, they all begin to cross paths, mostly because the peninsula is floating off like a bored cruise ship and strange times make strangers collide.

Europe, meanwhile, develops diplomatic anxiety that is usually reserved for inheritance disputes. The French are horrified at losing their favorite land gateway to warmer weather. The British look on as if someone has unplugged the kettle. Everyone else holds committee meetings, a form of ritualized theater that produces nothing but paper waste and moral exhaustion.

As the peninsula drifts, the five protagonists form a hesitant group. They travel through Portugal and Spain while the landmass slides westward, past the point where maps bother pretending to understand anything. Roads crack, rivers plunge into abyssal gaps, borders dissolve, and governments perform their usual trick of talking loudly instead of doing anything even remotely useful.

The book becomes a fable about belonging, identity, and the stubborn habit humans have of believing they run the place even while the place literally floats away without asking their permission. The land moves. The people scramble. The stray dogs bark. The birds argue with the sky. Bureaucrats measure the cracks with a ruler even as the cracks eat the ruler.

Through it all, these five wanderers trudge onward, forming a fragile companionship as the old world recedes behind them and a new, strange horizon forms ahead. Nothing is resolved in a tidy way, because tidy outcomes are for fairy tales and Saramago prefers loose ends flapping in the wind.

The whole thing is a parable wearing the trench coat of a disaster novel. It is unruly, defiant, full of long sentences that behave like they are being paid by the kilometer, and yet somehow it still hits a nerve.

Saramago starts with a ridiculous premise and then treats it as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Ordinary people discover that the universe has decided to involve them in a joke no one understands. It is funny until you realize it is also weary and sad, which is very much his brand. If this were not fiction, it would be sociology.

The metaphor is blunt in outline yet slippery in detail. A whole peninsula breaking free from Europe becomes a symbol for alienation, dislocation, and the uneasy truth that belonging is more fragile than we like to pretend. It is about the way nations cling to identities they barely understand, how communities fracture and reconfigure themselves, and how people search for meaning while the ground literally moves under them.

You can read the drifting landmass as political rupture, cultural detachment, historical exhaustion, or even the stubborn autonomy of places that never felt entirely European in the first place. Saramago hands you a giant floating rock and says, "Go on, figure it out. You will probably be wrong, but that is half the fun."

Why use such a metaphor? Because it is absurd enough to sidestep propaganda, dramatic enough to expose human vanity, and simple enough to hold a dozen interpretations at once. The man loved exaggeration as a diagnostic tool. If reality refuses to admit its own madness, he enlarges it until it explodes.

Is this a communist book? Not really. It is a book written by a communist, which is not the same thing. His politics inform the background, but the novel is not a manifesto. There are no lectures on class struggle or some tidy utopian blueprint. The world is unpredictable, absurd, often indifferent, yet somehow life goes on through human connection rather than official plans. Communism, capitalism, monarchy, democracy, it does not matter much. The continent is not taking any of their calls.

Saramago's recurring themes are all here. Ordinary people caught in extraordinary upheaval. Bureaucracy failing at the exact pace you expect. History behaving like a mischievous deity. Collective panic. A quiet insistence that solidarity among flawed strangers matters more than any institution. The casual cruelty of systems versus the stubborn decency of individuals. The calm, resigned humor about how poorly humanity handles its own messes. If you have read his other works, you will recognize the fingerprints.

It is a strange, wandering fable that requires patience, humor, and a taste for the surreal. If you want a story that nudges you out of the comfortable assumption that the world is stable and sensible, then go for it. If you crave tidy arcs and efficient prose, you might wish the peninsula had sunk instead.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Saramago's works not only keep me up late into the night reading, they also wake me from sleep in those hours after midnight that belong more to death than to life and force me to think again both about the words he has written and about those he has not. The Stone Raft is as multi-layered as the strata exposed when the Iberian Peninsula separates from the continent of Europe and begins an erratic journey through the Atlantic Ocean. There is, of course, the expected magical realism together with Saramago's incisive critiques of religion, politics, science, culture, and the human condition. There is the quest narrative with more than a subtle reference to Miguel de Cervantes' Iberian classic. There is the marvelous narrative style of the Maerchen used to tell of ordinary people having extraordinary experiences as they follow a fabulous hellhound in a pilgrimage across an insula that has lost its prefixed paene to become a pilgrim itself. There is the nature of pilgrimage, revealed in the peregrinations of these characters and in the relationships that develop among them in the course of their journeying. But most of all, what Saramago has written is a description of life, that pilgrimage toward death we all must make, which derives its meaning not from its destination but from those we learn to love along the way. We are all passengers on the great stone raft of Earth. According to Saramago, it is through relationships with our fellow voyagers that we make the journey worth the time.

[João Carlos · Rating 4 out of 5]

Casa dos Bicos - Fundação José Saramago - Lisboa - Portugal

Em 2015 li quatro romances de José Saramago (1922 – 2010): ”As Intermitências da Morte” (2005) - 4*, ”A Caverna” (2000) – 4*, ”O Evangelho Segundo Jesus Cristo” (1991) – 4* e ”Todos os Nomes” (1997) – 4* e em 2016 li ”O Ano da Morte de Ricardo Reis” (1984) – 4* - em todas as referenciadas obras a qualidade e a originalidade da “sua” escrita única são o denominador comum; José Saramago revela-se um criador de ”parábolas sustentadas pela imaginação, compaixão e ironia”.
A genialidade de José Saramago reside na utilização de uma peculiar e original estrutura narrativa que vai alterando em função da temática ou das temáticas dos seus romances, utilizando admiravelmente a ironia, o humor negro, quase sempre delirante e sarcástico. Explora, igualmente e ilimitadamente, as possibilidades da sua imaginação, manipulando o leitor em função de uma narrativa criativa que conjuga com profundas reflexões sobre inúmeros assuntos, como a música clássica, a literatura, com destaque para inúmeros escritores e poetas, sobre a política e os políticos, sobre a educação e as crenças religiosas, sobre a fé e os sacrifícios associados, enquadrando a culpa e a redenção, mas também sobre o mundo capitalista e as injustiças sociais e sobre muitas outras matérias.
”A Jangada de Pedra” (1986) é uma obra ficcional, uma alegoria, uma distopia – comum a alguns anteriores romances - em que José Saramago discorre sobre uma temática eternamente actual – de que o recente Brexit é revelador – na época aludindo à unificação da Europa, com a integração dos dois países ibéricos, Portugal e Espanha, que após várias ocorrências bizarras a que se associa um acontecimento incompreensível e sem explicação científica, se separam da Europa, vagueando ao sabor da correntes oceânicas em direcção aos Açores.
Decorridos trinta anos após a sua publicação ”A Jangada de Pedra” (1986) mantém toda a sua actualidade numa escrita singular, com os diálogos a serem incorporados na narrativa, sem aspas ou quebras de linha, omitindo os travessões, os pontos de interrogação ou de exclamação; entabulando profundas reflexões sobre as pessoas, o indivíduo, e sobre a vida, a bondade e a amizade, mas enfatizando sobre a “família” e as relações sexuais.
A 8 de Outubro de 1998 a Real Academia Sueca concede a José Saramago o Prémio Nobel da Literatura referindo que em ”A Jangada de Pedra” “(…) o escritor recorre a um estratagema típico. Uma série de acontecimentos sobrenaturais culmina na separação da Península Ibérica que começa a vogar no Atlântico, inicialmente em direcção aos Açores. A situação criada por Saramago dá-lhe um sem-número de oportunidades para, no seu estilo muito pessoal, tecer comentários sobre as grandezas e pequenezas da vida, ironizar sobre as autoridades e os políticos e, talvez muito especialmente, com os actores dos jogos de poder na alta política. O engenho de Saramago está ao serviço da sabedoria.”

[فهد الفهد · Rating 4 out of 5]

الطوف الحجري

كتب جوزيه ساراماغو هذه الرواية قبل روايته الأشهر (العمى) بتسع سنوات، ولكن لأن أغلبية القراء قرءوا العمى أولاً وكانت مدخلاً لهم للتعرف على هذا البرتغالي النوبلي، فلذا تأتي المقارنة دائماً معاكسة، وتبدو هذه الرواية وكأنها استعادة لموضوعة (ثيمة) العمى.

في هذه الرواية أيضاً نواجه موضوعة الحدث المفصلي الذي لا تفسير له، والذي يضرب المجتمع بقوة، فيخلخل توازناته، فكما قرأنا في العمى تحولات المجتمع الأعمى، وكيف تعيش شخصيات الرواية في ظل الجماعة الصغيرة التي نشأت وتقاربت في تلكم الظروف، نعاين في هذه الرواية أيضاً جماعة صغيرة تتكون بعدما تنفصل شبة الجزيرة الأيبيرية عن أوروبا وتبحر جارفة أسبانيا والبرتغال بعيداً، هذا الحدث الغريب يربط بين الشخصيات بالإضافة إلى أحداث غريبة تحدث لكل منهم، وهي أحداث لا يترددون في ربطها بحادثة الانفصال، واعتبارها سبباً للحادثة.

ساراماغو متشائم، لا يثق بالمجتمع، لا يثق بالسلطة ونلاحظ هذا في روايتيه هاتين (الطوف الحجري) و(العمى)، فالسلطة لا تعرف ماذا تفعل ! والسياسيون لا هم لهم إلا البحث عن من يلقون عليه بمسئولية الكارثة، والمجتمع ليس إلا قطعان خائفة، تبدو ثقة واهتمام وتركيز ساراماغو دائماً على الجماعة الصغيرة، وهي ليست جماعة قرابية، أو أيديولوجية، وإنما هي جماعة تكونها الصدفة، وتلحم بينها الرحلة التي تخوضها الجماعة خلال الرواية، ففي كلا الروايتين ترتحل الجماعة، ولكن وجود هذه الجماعة ورحلتها ليس رومانسياً حالماً، فساراماغو متشائم كما قلنا، فلذا تختلف الجماعة، وتمزقها مشاعر الخيانة والخجل، ولكن الغريب أنها لا تتفكك، ويتدبر ساراماغو بقائها ومقاومتها ونجاتها، ربما لم يكن البرتغالي بعد كل هذا بكل ذلكم التشاؤم.

يختلف من قرءوا الرواية حولها كثيراً، من يعرفون أسلوب ساراماغو، وقرءوا له من قبل، لا يجدون صعوبة في متابعته إلى النهاية، قانعين بأسلوبه الهادئ وتأملاته، البعض الآخر ربما يعتبر الرواية مملة، وبلا تفسيرات، وهي كذلك، أعني بلا تفسيرات، وهذه ربما رؤية ساراماغو لحياة الإنسان؟ رحلة طويلة، مملة، وبلا تفسيرات كافية، ولحظة انفصال الجزيرة الأيبيرية عن أوروبا، ربما هي لحظة انفصال الطفل عن أمه، لقد تقبلنا موقعنا الجغرافي كحقيقة دائمة، موقعنا من العالم يحدد من نحن، ماذا لو تحركت الأرض من تحتنا، وانجرفنا إلى مكان آخر؟ من نحن؟ هل نحن أوروبيون؟ هل نحن أمريكان؟ ماذا سيحدث لو اصدمنا بأرخبيل من الجزر؟ من يثير هذه الأسئلة سوى الروائي؟ لا أحد.

[Maedeh_P1H · Rating 1 out of 5]

از معدود کتاب هایی که نصفه رهاش کردم...
ایده ی داستان خوب بود اما روال داستان و شخصیت ها بشدت کسل کننده..

[Gaetano Laureanti · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sarà che sono un estimatore di Saramago, sarà che ero ben predisposto a questa lettura, ma questo libro mi è piaciuto davvero tanto.

Già l’idea iniziale, la terra che si spacca sui Pirenei Orientali e la penisola iberica che inizia a spostarsi, andando alla deriva proprio come la zattera del titolo, strappa la prima ola.

I personaggi principali sono persone comuni che vengono quasi trasfigurate all’inizio del misterioso fenomeno naturale, ciascuno con una caratteristica quasi magica e sovrannaturale che li contraddistingue.

Le loro storie si intrecciano, le coppie di amanti si formano ed il loro peregrinare si aggiunge a quello della popolazione iberica, spagnoli e portoghesi, percorrendo momenti straordinari e umani, ma sempre coinvolgenti dinanzi al prospettarsi di una possibile catastrofica collisione.

Le cronache del ruolo dell’Europa e degli Stati Uniti, durante le varie fasi della imprevedibile rotta della zattera di pietra, sono sorprendentemente attuali (nonostante il libro sia del 1986), e ci portano facilmente a pensare alla mancata integrazione dell’una ed alla avidità di controllo dell’altra; ma anche alla possibile nascita di un Mondo Nuovo. Con un giusto omaggio alle donne che mi sono apparse più sagge ed altruiste dei compagni. Ho amato Joana Carda, confesso.

La scrittura di Saramago, poi, è incredibile (onore anche alla traduzione che riesce a non vanificarne la struttura) e coinvolgente, con il suo caratteristico utilizzo della punteggiatura che contribuisce al fluire delle immagini e dei dialoghi; il respiro del poeta.

Saramago sembra quasi divertirsi nell’indugiare negli aspetti popolari (i proverbi, i detti e le filastrocche di paese) ed in quelli fantastici, come un abile tessitore che intreccia un meraviglioso arazzo naïf, in cui, comunque, traspare il valore nobile ed austero dell’arte.

La lettura di Saramago, infatti, è sempre impegnativa, porta a rileggere alcuni passaggi, ed inserisce spesso riflessioni personali e commenti ironici che arricchiscono la mente ed un po’ anche il cuore di quel lettore che trovi la giusta sintonia con il suo personale canale di comunicazione. E dopo è pura musica.

[Sine · Rating 3 out of 5]

saramago'yu taa üniversite yıllarımda, kitapçı gezerken şans eseri keşfetmiş ve aşık olmuştum. diyalogları virgüllerle ayırarak kurduğu uzun cümleleri, sarkastik dili, felaket senaryosunun üzerine daha da felaket hissi veren, "gerçekten aynı böyle olur, kafayı yeriz hep beraber" öngörüleriyle kitaplığımda da, kalbimde de ayrı bir yeri var. bu yüzden zamana yayarak okuyorum kitaplarını. şimdiye kadar da müthiş iyi anlaşıyorduk. bu kitapta ilişkimiz ilk defa çatırdadı. ya da küçük bi çıt sesi geldi diyelim. neden bilmiyorum, içine pek giremedim bu kitabın. halbuki genel olarak yorumlara bakılınca da hayli sevilmiş. hikayeyi başlatan felaket fikri muazzam, zaten uzun zamandır hevesle bekliyordum okumayı da; ama o spiralden aşağı kaosa doğru koşma hissini bir türlü alamadım bu kitapta, daha ritmsiz, daha sıkıcı buldum. yine şahane tespit ve öngörüleri de var, ama benim okuduklarım arasında en "okunmasa da olur" kitabı bu oldu maalesef. yıllar sonra tekrar bir dönüp bakarım belki, şimdi anlamamış da olabilirim, ya da yanlış zamanda denk gelmiş olabiliriz. seni hala çok seviyorum jose'cim, çıtlar bizi ayıramaz. 💛

[Simona · Rating 5 out of 5]

Solo un genio come Saramago poteva raccontare con così tanta poesia ed eleganza un evento catastrofico di tali proporzioni. Nella zona del Cerbere, al confine franco-spagnolo, dove i cani che non hanno corde vocali, cominciano ad abbaiare, ci si prepara alla catastrofe, ormai imminente. Qui la terra comincia a tremare e diventa una "zattera di pietra", errando nell'Oceano e lasciando che ognuno vada incontro al suo destino. Nella zattera di pietra si condensano le tematiche dell'uomo e dell'umanità, quali lo spaesamento, la desolazione, la solitudine, l'irrazionalità. Ognuno cerca di trovare una alternativa al proprio destino, quando ormai tutto viene a mancare.
In questo mondo che è una "commedia di sbagli", Saramago scova l'irreale nel reale dando vita a un libro che mescola prodigi, oscuri presagi che altro non sono che una grande metafora e allegoria della vita che stravolge cose e persone, trascinandole in balìa della corrente e delle onde.

[فؤاد · Rating 3 out of 5]

آدم وقتی از باقی جهان آشنا منقطع میشه، عادات روزمره براش ارزشی پیدا می کنن که در حالت عادی نداشتن. چون باعث احساس امنیت می شن، احساس آشنایی، احساس اتصال به جهان معهود، دستگیره‌ای می شن برای چنگ زدن و رها شدن از حالت معلق بودن و به هیچ جا بند نبودن.
من این حس رو زیاد تجربه نکردم، اما همون چند بار محدود به قدری اثر قدرتمندی داشت که توی خاطرم حک شد.
این کتاب یکی از اون دستگیره ها بود. تابستون بود، ده سال قبل، و من روی تخت بیمارستان بعد از یه عمل جراحی، تنها عمل جراحی که تا این لحظه توی ع��رم داشتم، و به خاطر همین همه چیز غریب بود و ناامن و پراضطراب. وقتی قرار شد برادرم بیاد به عنوان همراه شب پیشم بمونه، بهش گفتم این کتاب رو هم از خونه بیاره. کتاب رو قبل از عمل نصفه خونده بودم. و وقتی کتاب رو آورد و از جایی که علامت گذاشته بودم شروع کردم به خوندن، یک لحظه حسی منو گرفت. حس این که هنوز توی همون دنیای آشنام، هنوز توی همون دنیام که قبل از عمل هم بودم، هنوز توی همون دنیام که این کتاب رو داشتم می خوندم. و کتاب برام منبع آرامش شد.

کتاب، کتاب خوبی نبود. ایدهٔ مرکزیش (منقطع شدن شبه‌جزیره ایبری از باقی اروپا و شناور شدن در وسط اقیانوس اطلس) خیلی درخشان بود، اما داستانی که برای این ایده تعریف کرده بود چندان درخشان نبود. اما این تجربه توی بیمارستان اون قدر برام پراهمیته که به خاطرش دو ستاره رو سه ستاره می کنم.

[Claudia · Rating 4 out of 5]

http://amulherqueamalivros.blogs.sapo...

[Andrea Iginio Cirillo · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5/5

Terzo libro di Saramago che leggo dopo l'inarrivabile Le intermittenze della morte e Memoriale del convento; inscrivibile nella categoria del realismo magico, questo romanzo è formato da un miscuglio quanto mai omogeneo di stili: c'è il picaresco, c'è il trattato filosofico, c'è il fiabesco. Ed è proprio così che Saramago ci racconta questa incredibile storia della Penisola Iberica che si stacca dall'Europa, "non dalla Francia": come una fiaba. E i personaggi, per quanto intangibili dall'inizio alla fine perché aleatorie sono le loro descrizioni fisiche, hanno tuttavia una profondita che è degna dei grandi romanzieri e che fa affezionare il lettore che li segue in questa loro deriva per la Penisola la quale prosegue in parallelo con la deriva di questa zattera di pietra nell'Atlantico; personaggi con vite completamente diverse, ma che si uniscono in una comunione quasi mistica, e di cui non dimenticherò mai i nomi e soprattutto i cognomi, di cui Saramago ci spiega l'origine. Ma come tutte le fiabe, ci sono anche ammaestramenti: l'isolamento delle le nazioni dell'Europa meridionale, considerate palle al piede, fratelli stupidi, quando in realtà le risorse che possiedono farebbero tremare il mondo, le reazioni di facciata riportate dai mass media, la doppiezza dei governi, la folla animalesca. E con il microcosmo dei nostri personaggi principali, per tacer del cane e della meravigliosa Due cavalli e del due cavalli carro, entriamo nell'interiorità di uomini e donne a cui un evento assurdo (gli storni, la terra che trema, il bastoncino di olmo e così via) cambia la vita per sempre. Saramago è uno scrittore di una potenza inaudita, e quando entra nella storia lo fa da narratore onnisciente ma mai saccente, ironico, che spiega come un bravo professore e coinvolge i suoi allievi-lettori, chiarisce, guida e governa ciò che è nato dalla sua penna (memorabili la definizione di perifrasi o gli innumerevoli modi di dire citati). Meraviglia, insomma, che mi fa desiderare tutta la bibliografia esistente di questo genio portoghese.

[Yuri Sharon · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don’t quite know why it has taken me so long to get to this writer. This book has been on my shelf for more than two decades. It is one of those novels a reader regrets having finished. I now wish to read some of this author’s other works.
Much of the attraction is Saramago’s distinctive, discursive style, which derives from his decision to restrict his punctuation to commas and full-stops – no dashes or exclamation marks! In respecting this conceit, the translator allows English-speaking readers to experience the timbre and resonance of the writer’s oral flow. It is a style that gives Saramago room and opportunity to discuss anything, including his own writing, and there are numerous asides concerning matters usually considered extraneous to the plot.
The multi-layered plot is in fact a gossamer woven out of thin air. Without drifting into what may be considered “magic realism”, Saramago has no problem using plainly impossible circumstances as the basis of his story. The Iberian peninsula breaks away from Europe and drifts off into the Atlantic, and the main characters possess varying degrees of supra-human powers, but all this is more or less mere background information to the tales of their travels, loves and adventures. The social changes they witness are also related in a naturalist manner, unfurling a healthy and entertaining level of satire concerning contemporary social attitudes.
Although a little ashamed at having neglected this writer, I am also delighted (at my age) to find such rare and precious works are there to be yet discovered.

[Mariafrancesca di natura viperesca sta con gli ultimi della terra · Rating 5 out of 5]

Una 2CV per amica...


[Scusate se irrompo ma la foto della 2CV può sembrare una intrusa per chi non avesse letto il libro e io, rileggendo, mi sono accorta di avere tralasciato il sesto personaggio, senza cui metà storia non avrebbe avuto seguito o almeno non così come è stato. Ecco, la 2Cv io la conosco bene. Per quattordici anni mi portò in giro prima ragazza e poi mamma e quando quei maledetti freni a pompa mi tradirono e mi trascinarono fino nel mezzo dell'incrocio rischiando la vita dei miei bambini, dietro negli "infasit", o come cavolo si chiamavano quei cosi, ecco, dicevo, me ne liberai per una panda di quinta mano ma con banali freni a disco. La mia 2Cv arancio non era quella di Joaqim Sassa: perdeva pezzi, si fermava appena vedeva la minima salita, nelle curve andava per i fatti suoi e decideva lei quando i vetri dovevano chiudersi sul mio gomito, facendomi sobbalzare. Anch'io l'ho amata e ancora la penso ma non al punto da farne un'eroina invincibile: l'ho amata nonostante i suoi difetti o forse per questi].

Adoro il flusso ironico di pensiero di Saramago, mai concentrato sul suo ombelico ma sulla povera gente - e non solo per ceto e per censo - scaraventata in questo mondo senza che le sia stato chiesto se gradiva nascere o vivere lì e ora.
Dopo un bel gruppo di libri cupi, in relazione biunivoca con i tempi che viviamo nel senso che la depressione esistenziale dell'autore e lettore si scambiano emozioni non proprio allegracuore, mi ci voleva ridere riflettendo sull'assurdità della vita a cui, però, siamo legati indissolubilmente fino ad amarla, questa assurdità.
Non è che Saramago navighi in superficie e la sua ironia sia epidermica e auto-celebrativa: piuttosto nasconde un pessimismo di fondo sulle magnifiche sorti e progressive umane e allo stesso tempo un irresistibile impulso allo sfottò di coloro che detengono un ridicolo potere ripetendo sempre le stesse parole – un qua qua qua- qualunque sia l'evento per cui li sprecano, ieri e oggi.
Gli piace giocare sull’ origine della concatenazione degli eventi da "una radicata superstizione, o salda convinzione, che in molti casi è l'espressione alternativa parallela", tanto per rimarcare che sì la ragione è necessaria ma spesso non sufficiente.
Quasi per magia, infatti, succede“… che la Penisola Iberica si mosse un altro po’, un metro, due metri, per provare le forze… Dopo ci fu una pausa, si sentì passare nell’aria un grande soffio, come il primo respiro profondo di chi si sveglia, e la massa di pietra e terra, coperta di città, villaggi, fiumi, boschi, fabbriche, macchie incolte, campi coltivati, con la sua gente e i suoi animali, cominciò a muoversi, come una barca che si allontana dal porto e punta al mare di nuovo ignoto.”
Gli eventi narrati procedono passo passo ma le digressioni, mai noiose, ne interrompono il flusso: “trascorsi quindici minuti, che, come si dice, parvero quindici secoli, benché questi ultimi nessuno li avesse ancora vissuti per poterli paragonare a quelli,…” che ci restituisce i milioni di microfatti umani intercorsi in quei pochi minuti che riempiono lo scorrere del tempo altrimenti senza senso.
Così, quando José Anaiço, Joaquim Sassa e Pedro Orce si incontrano per la prima volta sotto un olivo, Saramago ha lo scrupolo di precisare che si tratta di un olivo cordovil che connota il luogo in cui si incontrano. E ci racconta del luogo e della sua storia, cioè il tempo andato e il presente perché è l’imposizione del nome che ne denota l’esistenza. A differenza del “generico fico” del vangelo.
E poi tutti a bordo di una 2Cavalli che li porta alla ricerca della causa prima del distacco.

È evidente che il distacco della penisola iberica dal continente e della sua deriva nell’Oceano Atlantico (è lei la “zattera di pietra” del titolo) sia una metafora : nella catastrofe della storia la penisola iberica, come l’arca di Noè, porta in salvo – dove? - i rappresentanti di una umanità forse destinata a migliorarne i caratteri sociali.
La spaccatura dei Pirenei e la deriva appena iniziata della penisola Iberica provoca, infatti, reazioni similissime a quelle provocate dal Covid alla sua comparsa: uguali pensieri e parole. Compresa la reazione del Mercato Comune Europeo come si chiamava l'UE ai tempi della pubblicazione del libro. Il pregiudizio sull'inaffidabilità delle terre del Sud non è nuovo e, come si vede, precede anche la globalizzazione finanziaria- attenzione, non economica stante l’etimologia della parola - che ha come obiettivo la cosiddetta selezione darwiniana. La quale però è interpretata alla rovescia: sopravvivono in natura non i più forti ma coloro che si adattano e evidentemente noi poverini sopravviviamo nonostante 'sti nordici e sono loro che hanno paura di noi.
E che deriva sia, sembra dire Saramago, a queste condizioni.
Non mancano nemmeno correlazioni fantasmatiche tra eventi non correlabili: le polveri sottili veicolo di contagio del Covid per esempio così come la pietra lanciata da Joaquin Sassa sulla spiaggia per il gioco dei cerchi con la fenditura.
Oltre l'ironia e lo sfottò non può mancare in Saramago la storia d'amore dolce e gentile in cui l'unione di sesso e sentimento danno origine a qualcosa di più grande e completo.

Il finale è aperto : come finirà la storia di questi uomini nuovi, pionieri di un nuovo modo più solidale di vedere il mondo?
In fondo è il vecchio sogno palingenetico che fa capolino anche in questi giorni in cui il distanziamento sociale ci fa scoprire la nostalgia del calore della vicinanza e sognare un mondo nuovo e più pulito.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

I admit, I love Saramago's work, but I would only recommend The Stone Raft to his most ardent fans; If you are intrigued by the idea of the Iberian peninsula breaking off of Europe and the possible ramifications thereof, you have missed the point and will be thoroughly disappointed. The Stone Raft is beautifully written (of course), but Saramago meanders, philosophizes, uses allegory and parables, all towards what seemed to be an existentialist tale of five wanderers of the Iberian peninsula (plus one possibly angelic dog who does not bark, for that would be unseemly of an angelic creature). In my estimation, the Iberian peninsula is simply a microcosm for the 'Stone Raft' we all inhabit: This Island Earth (to borrow from a song title). What we are confronted with is the sojourn of five individuals who stoically continue their lives despite their absurd circumstances and geopolitics, just as we all do on our giant 'Stone Raft.' This is a book about the absurdity of the human condition, love, life, and ultimately death, exercising very little control over ones situation and circumstance; an existentialist novel through and through, yet more lighthearted than Camus' tour de force, The Plague.