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The Fat Man and Infinity: And Other Writings
A lyrical, searing work of autobiography, reflection, and fiction, evoking García Márquez's memoirs and Pamuk's Istanbul. António Lobo Antunes's sole ambition from the age of seven was to be a writer. Here, in The Fat Man and Infinity , "the heir to Conrad and Faulkner" (George Steiner) reflects on the fractured paradise of his childhood―the world of prim, hypocritical, class-riven Lisbon in midcentury. His Proust-like memoirs, written over thirty years in chronicle form, pass through the filter of an adult who has known war and pain, and bear witness to the people whom he loved and who have gone into the dark. Stunningly translated by Margaret Jull Costa, in prose that glides like poetry, this is a modern-day chronicle of Portugal's imperfect past and arresting present, seen through the eyes of a master fiction writer, one on a short list to win a Nobel Prize. Readers particularly touched by Frank McCourt's Angela's Ashes will be drawn to this journey into the heart of one of our greatest living writers.
320 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2009
13 people are currently reading
176 people want to read
About the author
António Lobo Antunes
88 books1,042 followersAt the age of seven, António Lobo Antunes decided to be a writer but when he was 16, his father sent him to medical school - he is a psychiatrist. During this time he never stopped writing.
By the end of his education he had to join the Army, to take part in the war in Angola, from 1970 to 1973. It was there, in a military hospital, that he gained interest for the subjects of death and the other. The Angolan war for independence later became subject to many of his novels. He worked many months in Germany and Belgium.
In 1979, Lobo Antunes published his first novel - Memória de Elefante (Elephant's Memory), where he told the story of his separation. Due to the success of his first novel, Lobo Antunes decided to devote his evenings to writing. He has been practicing psychiatry all the time, though, mainly at the outpatient's unit at the Hospital Miguel Bombarda of Lisbon.
His style is considered to be very dense, heavily influenced by William Faulkner, James Joyce and Louis-Ferdinand Céline.
He has an extensive work, translated into several languages. Among the many awards he has received so far, in 2007 he received the Camões Award, the most prestigious Portuguese literary award.
By the end of his education he had to join the Army, to take part in the war in Angola, from 1970 to 1973. It was there, in a military hospital, that he gained interest for the subjects of death and the other. The Angolan war for independence later became subject to many of his novels. He worked many months in Germany and Belgium.
In 1979, Lobo Antunes published his first novel - Memória de Elefante (Elephant's Memory), where he told the story of his separation. Due to the success of his first novel, Lobo Antunes decided to devote his evenings to writing. He has been practicing psychiatry all the time, though, mainly at the outpatient's unit at the Hospital Miguel Bombarda of Lisbon.
His style is considered to be very dense, heavily influenced by William Faulkner, James Joyce and Louis-Ferdinand Céline.
He has an extensive work, translated into several languages. Among the many awards he has received so far, in 2007 he received the Camões Award, the most prestigious Portuguese literary award.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
January 21, 2011
The three segments of this book offer a simply dazzling collection of the writers work. His essays confront childhood and memory with such succinct acuteness that one feels compelled to sit awhile after each brief foray and contemplate the beauty of being young, naive, and full of wonder. Then, he takes the reader into a world of adulthood pock-marked with reticent hope and insecurity, exploring the idea that ones passion, especially when having to do with the creation of art, may or may not live up to the expectations held. The final segment consists of short stories that belie the facade of modern living. These stories are wrought with angst without drowning in hubris; they deal with choices and denial. He is able touch upon the universality of the simple condition of being human and all the joys, sorrows, and emotions that are the products of being alive.
October 21, 2013
If Raymond Carver is the American master of minimalism and purveyor of domestic dramas in plainchant, then Antunes is Portugal's polyphonic reply as the Iberian Faulkner or Joyce without all the narrative confusion. In the quote above a man sits at a table eating braised rabbit and rehearses all that he wishes to say to his lover, knowing that he lacks the courage, torn as he is to be the dutiful son and care for his ailing mother. He really has the need to talk, to declare his love and yet he won't because he can't. His beloved will love Carlos, the other man in her life. It would seem that everyone in Portugal has a lover on the side without blinking. In the end the repetition of "feeding corn to the chickens" announces, with the repeated throwing down of corn to the floor, his resignation.
Antunes is a trained psychiatrist and he is an astute observer of the human emotional and mental landscape. Most of his stories - there are 107 of them in this volume - have some form of interior dialogue and introspective journey, whether it is the man recalling childhood, a dying woman recalling happier days, or a spouse speaking of destructive routines and infidelity (his and hers). Speaking is key to all these stories; Antunes is a masterly storyteller because the reader is privy to multiple conversations, imagined questions and answers, announcements and wished-for declarations in flowing paragraphs of discourse that break traditional syntax. You shouldn't be able to follow the conversation but you are in the conversation as it unfolds emotionally and logically. The sentences should not work but they do.
Equally admirable is that all 107 stories in this volume are 600 to 800 words long. In the world of `flash fiction' each of the 107 stories are crown jewels. Antunes dismisses these particular writings as divertissements or `entertainments.' He writes novels on the side (I write that with humor). These stories appeared as weekly contributions to the O Público newspaper. The Portuguese word for these stories is crónicas, a rather misleading word since Antunes is true to its etymological truth: chronicles.
The stories are occasionally dark but there is humor. Antunes dislikes using computers for writing. There is the woman who waits for her lover, recalling that he was upset and frustrated with her bra in their last amorous encounter, so she buys "a black lace bra today that opens at the front." There is the poetic: God is not absent in the modern world. He just takes His time making a decision and loves jazz. Antunes depicts the ordinary in extraordinary ways, from simplicity to the tragic, from the joyous to the profoundly heartbreaking: the divorced woman is plagued by her mother about her weight or the slow toll of death by cancer, seen from within and without. Who else could enumerate the loss of childhood innocence by entitling the short story as `Who Had To Murder Me To Make Me So Sweet?' The title story of the volume is a story of a writer working through writer's block.
Antunes is a trained psychiatrist and he is an astute observer of the human emotional and mental landscape. Most of his stories - there are 107 of them in this volume - have some form of interior dialogue and introspective journey, whether it is the man recalling childhood, a dying woman recalling happier days, or a spouse speaking of destructive routines and infidelity (his and hers). Speaking is key to all these stories; Antunes is a masterly storyteller because the reader is privy to multiple conversations, imagined questions and answers, announcements and wished-for declarations in flowing paragraphs of discourse that break traditional syntax. You shouldn't be able to follow the conversation but you are in the conversation as it unfolds emotionally and logically. The sentences should not work but they do.
Equally admirable is that all 107 stories in this volume are 600 to 800 words long. In the world of `flash fiction' each of the 107 stories are crown jewels. Antunes dismisses these particular writings as divertissements or `entertainments.' He writes novels on the side (I write that with humor). These stories appeared as weekly contributions to the O Público newspaper. The Portuguese word for these stories is crónicas, a rather misleading word since Antunes is true to its etymological truth: chronicles.
The stories are occasionally dark but there is humor. Antunes dislikes using computers for writing. There is the woman who waits for her lover, recalling that he was upset and frustrated with her bra in their last amorous encounter, so she buys "a black lace bra today that opens at the front." There is the poetic: God is not absent in the modern world. He just takes His time making a decision and loves jazz. Antunes depicts the ordinary in extraordinary ways, from simplicity to the tragic, from the joyous to the profoundly heartbreaking: the divorced woman is plagued by her mother about her weight or the slow toll of death by cancer, seen from within and without. Who else could enumerate the loss of childhood innocence by entitling the short story as `Who Had To Murder Me To Make Me So Sweet?' The title story of the volume is a story of a writer working through writer's block.
January 4, 2014
I love Antunes, but this is a different kind of book and I'd give this three and a half stars if I could. The essays (musings, really) were interesting and I liked seeing how the details from his life recurred in the stories. I also enjoyed seeing some of his language use and signature stylistic moves (e.g. line breaks mid-paragraph) in a medium where I was less tied up in story. The most interesting thing about the stories, though, was watching the themes and objects recur in them.
This would be a good book to read if you are interested in how an author's life is reflected in his work or in how themes can be reexamined in various stories. Otherwise I'd recommend dipping in and out of this book for inspiration, rather than reading straight through.
This would be a good book to read if you are interested in how an author's life is reflected in his work or in how themes can be reexamined in various stories. Otherwise I'd recommend dipping in and out of this book for inspiration, rather than reading straight through.
March 14, 2009
antunes crafts some of the world's most vivid and lively prose. the brief selections in the fat man and infinity demonstrate that he is as masterful at creating brief vignettes as he is epic novels. as two-thirds of this book is comprised of autobiographical writings, it allows the reader considerable insight into the author's life and his background (from boyhood, through his service in the angolan civil war, and into his years of shifting his profession from psychiatry to full-time writing). the final third of the book is made up of very short stories, none longer than a mere four pages. in each section of the book, whether fact, fiction, or on the tenuous line between the two, antunes' writing is full of grace, humility, and tenderness, even when writing about betrayal and heartbreak. there's a depth and richness to his work that makes each piece seem so personal, as if he is relating a story that happened to someone we know as intimately as he does. his observations and insights into human frailty, the imagination, romantic yearnings, and the minutiae of everyday life are incomparable keen, yet there's a quiet, contented ease (however full of passion) that permeates each story like the subtlest of breezes barely perceptible. it is of little wonder that antunes is widely mentioned as a perennial candidate for the nobel prize, as nearly everything he has written seems to be utterly exquisite and arresting.
as always, margaret jull costa's translation is fluid and seamless.
as always, margaret jull costa's translation is fluid and seamless.
July 7, 2025
A book of short three page pieces throughout, consisting of the author’s reminiscences of his boyhood years and then short stories mainly written in the first person about individuals and their lives. I particularly enjoyed the memoir part of the book. In this part, the author sense of humor is more aparent.
The writing style in this book is very different from his novels. (I have read seven).
This book was first published in Portuguese in 2004 and translated into English in 2009.
The writing style in this book is very different from his novels. (I have read seven).
This book was first published in Portuguese in 2004 and translated into English in 2009.
March 23, 2025
The fat man and infinity and other writings is an intimate collection of short stories that gives us a glimpse into the highly emotional world of Atunes. Each story hits like a crisp winter morning, some come with warm sunshine, others come with a brisk spell of rain that leaves you yearning for warmth.
I would recommend reading it at your own pace, pick it up once in a while.
I would recommend reading it at your own pace, pick it up once in a while.
May 11, 2009
i am really into antunes right now and am waiting for my copy of this book to come soon! i would like to start a topic, conversation of this author, but i thought it would be better if i had read something autobiographical first. it just didnt feel right if i didnt know/ have some insight first into his own view of life. maybe im wrong?
October 27, 2016
There's this warm melancholy of accepting life for what it is in each of these stories, that make me each time want to hear yet another of his stories. Whether you're young, old, lonely alone, lonely with someone, potentially happy - life according to Antunes is a mix of flavours and it's beautiful whatever it serves us.
February 12, 2012
Wonderful slice of life stories.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews