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Act of the Damned
As the socialist revolution closes in, a once-wealthy Portuguese family is accused of "economic sabotage." They must escape across the border to Spain, then on to Brazil -- but the family is bankrupt, financially and spiritually. The patriarch, Diogo, lies dying, while his rapacious offspring rifle through his belongings, searching for his will. He remembers with bitterness and resignation his foolish marriage to his brother's beautiful mistress, who left him with a mongoloid daughter and a simpleminded son, who at sixty is running toy trains past his father's deathbed with the solemn self-importance of a five-year-old. Told through a rippling overlay of voices, Act of the Damned circles closer and closer to the revelation of the diabolical immorality of Diogo's greedy son-in-law Rodrigo . . . who has fathered a child of his own bastard daughter and who is closing in on Diogo's crumbling estate. In the oppressive autumn heat, the characters' schemes ebb and flow in an atmosphere of decrepit elegance, tarnished silver, and rotting brocade. When the moment of departure finally arrives, the scene shifts from chaos to vacuum and Rodrigo finds himself no longer at the center of the group but firmly, terrifyingly, outside and alone.
246 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1985
21 people are currently reading
835 people want to read
About the author
António Lobo Antunes
88 books1,039 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 - 30 of 71 reviews
December 31, 2025
Southern gothic comes to Portugal. As I wrote of Antunes' work in another review, An Explanation of the Birds, every character is deeply flawed; every cup is cracked; every window is grimy; every spoon is greasy. The story is set in the 1970’s around the time of the Portuguese revolution when the dictator Salazar was overthrown and a socialist government was installed. An old established family finds itself on the wrong side of the political wind. As the patriarch lays dying, the children desperately search for his will hoping to get money to flee the country. But they are bankrupt -- financially, morally and spiritually.
Two of the patriarch’s children are mentally challenged – his 60-year old son is always underfoot playing with trains; his sister calls him “monkey brother.” But the diabolical immorality prize goes to his son-in-law who has fathered an illegitimate retarded daughter and a grandchild by her as well. He is the main character, a dentist who is disgusted by his clients. He works on teeth with a television on showing old classic American movies: Edward G. Robinson, Gene Kelly, Leslie Caron
The old patriarchal family lives in decrepit elegance. (This could be a genre – old families hanging on to their crumbling, decaying mansions in what has become the wrong side of town – I think of Sabato’s On Heroes and Tombs in Buenos Aires and Hatoum’s A Tale of a Certain Orient set in Manaus, Brazil.) Tarnished silver, moldy books, leaky roofs, dogs crapping on rotting carpets, tattered brocade.
It’s an ugly story with strong literary writing. Here are some examples of Antunes style all within two pages:
“…the smugglers I sometimes saw in the tavern, leaning over the bar to talk business with the bar owner, their mouths full of cheese and good deals.”
“…the empty pantry, occupied by a solitary old woman in a wheelchair, her bugging irises gleaming with affliction.”
“…the rain changed the color of the sounds I was hearing, turning them thick and dark, heavy like tears, and I smelled a profound dustiness, as if from a trapdoor that had been shut for centuries.”
Chapters are in voices of the different characters. The tension builds as the family tries to get itself together to flee the country. An ugly story but a fascinating read.
I have read two other novels by Antunes and links to my reviews are below:
An Explanation of the Birds
The Splendor of Portugal
With the passing of Jose Saramago, Antunes is my nominee for the next Portuguese Nobel prize winner. Born in 1942, he has written about three dozen novels, most translated into English. He is also a doctor and in the early 1970s worked in military hospitals in Angola. It's unfortunate that none of his works have large numbers of reviews on GR - at most just a few hundred. He's best-known in English for The Inquisitors' Manual.
(Photo from thecitypictures.net)
Two of the patriarch’s children are mentally challenged – his 60-year old son is always underfoot playing with trains; his sister calls him “monkey brother.” But the diabolical immorality prize goes to his son-in-law who has fathered an illegitimate retarded daughter and a grandchild by her as well. He is the main character, a dentist who is disgusted by his clients. He works on teeth with a television on showing old classic American movies: Edward G. Robinson, Gene Kelly, Leslie Caron
The old patriarchal family lives in decrepit elegance. (This could be a genre – old families hanging on to their crumbling, decaying mansions in what has become the wrong side of town – I think of Sabato’s On Heroes and Tombs in Buenos Aires and Hatoum’s A Tale of a Certain Orient set in Manaus, Brazil.) Tarnished silver, moldy books, leaky roofs, dogs crapping on rotting carpets, tattered brocade.
It’s an ugly story with strong literary writing. Here are some examples of Antunes style all within two pages:
“…the smugglers I sometimes saw in the tavern, leaning over the bar to talk business with the bar owner, their mouths full of cheese and good deals.”
“…the empty pantry, occupied by a solitary old woman in a wheelchair, her bugging irises gleaming with affliction.”
“…the rain changed the color of the sounds I was hearing, turning them thick and dark, heavy like tears, and I smelled a profound dustiness, as if from a trapdoor that had been shut for centuries.”
Chapters are in voices of the different characters. The tension builds as the family tries to get itself together to flee the country. An ugly story but a fascinating read.
I have read two other novels by Antunes and links to my reviews are below:
An Explanation of the Birds
The Splendor of Portugal
With the passing of Jose Saramago, Antunes is my nominee for the next Portuguese Nobel prize winner. Born in 1942, he has written about three dozen novels, most translated into English. He is also a doctor and in the early 1970s worked in military hospitals in Angola. It's unfortunate that none of his works have large numbers of reviews on GR - at most just a few hundred. He's best-known in English for The Inquisitors' Manual.
(Photo from thecitypictures.net)
November 16, 2025
When I scan this novel—which is not the case with all the books by this author—I am referring to the technical ease and interest that do not get lost. I loved and admired him. I enjoyed finding him whenever I could. For these reasons, I recommend it without hesitation to see how Lobo Antunes is a great writer.
January 23, 2020
“E pensei Que falta o ódio faz para nos sentirmos saudáveis, e pensei Acharmo-nos em harmonia com o mundo é uma infecção mortal.”
Depois dos psiquiatras das obras que li anteriormente, Lobo Antunes traz-nos um dentista fascinado pela era dourada de Hollywood, que age como se fosse o Edward G. Robinson e dá o tom para todo o livro, pois é realmente como se nos tivessem administrado uma dose de gás hilariante. Depressa saímos de Lisboa e chegamos ao Alentejo onde uma família em plena decadência financeira e moral espera que o hediondo patriarca morra para tratar das partilhas e fugir para Espanha, com receio dos comunistas do pós-25 de Abril. As personagens e as situações são dignas de um dos melhores filmes de Almodóvar, mas a escrita é a mais perfeita renda de bilros.
Na verdade, diria que é mais que o Auto dos Danados: é o auto dos depravados, dos degenerados, dos desprezados, dos desesperados, dos perfeitos anormais. Uma obra-prima.
“Mas não há nada que os espelhos não destruam ao reenviarem-nos a nós mesmos, manchados de carimbos de estanho como encomendas postais sem endereço, de forma que me levantei, peguei no relógio dos anjinhos pela base e assassinei todos aqueles sardónicos rectângulos de vidro nas suas grossas molduras de talha. (...) Foi a minha mãe que quis o quarto assim, foi ela que o enfeitou desta maneira a seguir à morte do meu pai a fim de se sentir, ao menos, acompanhada por si própria, ou nem sequer por si própria mas pelas suas onduladas e mentirosas miragens, sabendo perfeitamente que o que vemos de nós é tão diferente de nós como o somos de um estranho."
Depois dos psiquiatras das obras que li anteriormente, Lobo Antunes traz-nos um dentista fascinado pela era dourada de Hollywood, que age como se fosse o Edward G. Robinson e dá o tom para todo o livro, pois é realmente como se nos tivessem administrado uma dose de gás hilariante. Depressa saímos de Lisboa e chegamos ao Alentejo onde uma família em plena decadência financeira e moral espera que o hediondo patriarca morra para tratar das partilhas e fugir para Espanha, com receio dos comunistas do pós-25 de Abril. As personagens e as situações são dignas de um dos melhores filmes de Almodóvar, mas a escrita é a mais perfeita renda de bilros.
Na verdade, diria que é mais que o Auto dos Danados: é o auto dos depravados, dos degenerados, dos desprezados, dos desesperados, dos perfeitos anormais. Uma obra-prima.
“Mas não há nada que os espelhos não destruam ao reenviarem-nos a nós mesmos, manchados de carimbos de estanho como encomendas postais sem endereço, de forma que me levantei, peguei no relógio dos anjinhos pela base e assassinei todos aqueles sardónicos rectângulos de vidro nas suas grossas molduras de talha. (...) Foi a minha mãe que quis o quarto assim, foi ela que o enfeitou desta maneira a seguir à morte do meu pai a fim de se sentir, ao menos, acompanhada por si própria, ou nem sequer por si própria mas pelas suas onduladas e mentirosas miragens, sabendo perfeitamente que o que vemos de nós é tão diferente de nós como o somos de um estranho."
October 15, 2016
”Auto do Danados” o sexto romance do escritor português António Lobo Antunes (n. 1942) foi publicado em 1985 e a narrativa começa ”Na segunda quarta-feira de Setembro de mil novecentos e setenta e cinco (…)”.
Com a Revolução do 25 de Abril de 1974 ou a Revolução dos Cravos ocorreu a deposição do regime fascista/ditatorial, o denominado Estado Novo ou salazarista, em referência a António Oliveira Salazar, o seu fundador e inicial líder; num movimento revolucionário iniciado por vários sectores militares das Forças Armadas que destituíram o governo liderado por Marcelo Caetano. Como resultado, todos os partidos políticos foram legalizados, assistindo-se, igualmente, à extinção da polícia política PIDE, entrando o país numa indescritível agitação revolucionária.
Até que por vicissitudes várias inicia-se em 1975 um dos períodos revolucionários mais conturbados – o denominado Verão Quente de 1975 em que o governo passou a ser dominado por uma esquerda radical liderada pelos militares Costa Gomes, Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho e Vasco Gonçalves, com a estatização de sectores industriais e bancos, e pela ocupação de terras para implementar a reforma agrária.
Para Nuno, o primeiro narrador, dentista, a ”(…) segunda quarta-feira de Setembro de mil novecentos e setenta e cinco (…)” é o seu último dia de trabalho no consultório antes de fugir com a sua família para Espanha, receosos do radicalismo revolucionário que se está a instalar em Portugal.
O enquadramento social do primeiro narrador, Nuno, e da sua família é evidente; pertencem a uma família burguesa, vivem no Restelo, o bairro mais elitista da capital portuguesa, Lisboa, num quotidiano dominado pela mentira e pelo desrespeito – ele traí a sua mulher Ana com Mafalda – e que é confrontado com a situação terminal de Diogo, o patriarca da família, no leito de morte na sua mansão, na herdade situada nas proximidades de Reguengos de Monsaraz, Alentejo, e do rio Guadiana, onde os seus filhos e demais familiares se confrontam com o fim do “pai”, “aparentemente” o pai extremoso e genuinamente puro e exemplar, mas que na realidade é o latifundiário temido e autoritário, violento para os familiares e para os trabalhadores rurais, exercendo arbitrariamente a violência e o ódio, num cenário dominado pelas traições conjugais, pelas ligações familiares ilegítimas, numa violência desmesurada.
O romance ”Auto dos Danados” vai sendo construído e desenvolvido com recurso às memórias dos vários narradores, em cinco capítulos: “antevéspera do festa”, “véspera da festa”, “primeiro dia da festa”, “segundo dia da festa” e “terceiro dia da festa” - em vários períodos e espaços que se vão cruzando, no presente, no passado mais recente e no passado mais longínquo, numa interpretação e numa perspectiva individual, pensamentos por vezes desordenados e complexos de acompanhar, pela multiplicidade dos relatos dos membros familiares, num enredo fragmentado e com critérios diferenciados pelos respectivos narradores, sobre as complexas relações familiares, entre homens e mulheres, sobre os distúrbios mentais e a esquizofrenia; uma das personagens é portadora de síndrome de Down, a “mongolóide”, sem nome, e muito mais.
António Lobo Antunes desmistifica de uma forma exemplar a normal percepção de harmonia no seio das famílias burguesas, supostamente abastadas, num tom quase sempre sarcástico, violento e misógino, sobre a desagregação familiar, espiritualmente e financeiramente, num dos períodos mais conturbados da recente história de Portugal, numa analogia perfeita entre a família e o pais.
”Auto do Danados” é um excelente romance, indispensável, mas de leitura exigente e proactiva.
António Lobo Antunes - 86º Feira do Livro - Lisboa - Portugal (2016-05-28)
António Lobo Antunes, o eterno candidato ao Prémio Nobel da Literatura, proferiu as seguintes declarações sobre a entrega do prémio a Bob Dylan em 2016:
Como é que está?
A trabalhar. O que é que hei-de fazer? Não tenho mais nada para fazer...
Também estou a trabalhar. Não tenho mais nada para fazer...
(risos) Pois. Não temos mais nada para fazer, olhe.
Queria ter uma reacção sua à atribuição do Nobel ao Bob Dylan.
Não vou dizer nada. Nunca falei quando me deram prémios, não vou falar quando não me dão.
Estava a referir-me ao Bob Dylan em si.
Eu gosto.
Porquê?
Gosto das letras, gosto das músicas, acho que é muito bom.
Não fazia ideia.
Não gosta dele?
Não conheço bem.
Vale a pena ouvir. Ele é bom. E é um homem interessante.
Recorda-se de alguma música em particular?
Tem várias. (silêncio) Isso é uma coisa, outra é darem um Nobel a uma pessoa que faz canções. Mas isso não tenho nada que ter opiniões.
Sabe que está toda a gente a estranhar o prémio.
Há muita indignação, é?
É. Porque é um cantor.
Não me quero meter nisso. Normalmente não faço comentários quando dão o prémio a alguém. É muito fácil dar opiniões. Mas isso de que serve? A gente pode questionar as coisas a outro nível, mas isso não me interessa. Para mim o Prémio Nobel da Literatura não é aquilo, mas é uma opinião pessoal, posso não ter razão nenhuma. As pessoas fazem o que quiserem.
É o que as pessoas acham. Começando pelo facto de o prémio ter sido dado a um cantor.
Isso é discutível. É evidente que há grandes escritores que nunca ganharam nada. O Tolstói, tantos. Todos os prémios são aleatórios, todos os prémios são discutíveis. Dêem a quem derem, as pessoas discutem. Eu não daria, mas isso é uma opinião pessoal, não quero polémicas nem chatices nem nada. Deram àquele, pronto, não tenho que discutir. Quem sou eu para dar opiniões?
In revista Visão (13 Outubro 2016)
Com a Revolução do 25 de Abril de 1974 ou a Revolução dos Cravos ocorreu a deposição do regime fascista/ditatorial, o denominado Estado Novo ou salazarista, em referência a António Oliveira Salazar, o seu fundador e inicial líder; num movimento revolucionário iniciado por vários sectores militares das Forças Armadas que destituíram o governo liderado por Marcelo Caetano. Como resultado, todos os partidos políticos foram legalizados, assistindo-se, igualmente, à extinção da polícia política PIDE, entrando o país numa indescritível agitação revolucionária.
Até que por vicissitudes várias inicia-se em 1975 um dos períodos revolucionários mais conturbados – o denominado Verão Quente de 1975 em que o governo passou a ser dominado por uma esquerda radical liderada pelos militares Costa Gomes, Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho e Vasco Gonçalves, com a estatização de sectores industriais e bancos, e pela ocupação de terras para implementar a reforma agrária.
Para Nuno, o primeiro narrador, dentista, a ”(…) segunda quarta-feira de Setembro de mil novecentos e setenta e cinco (…)” é o seu último dia de trabalho no consultório antes de fugir com a sua família para Espanha, receosos do radicalismo revolucionário que se está a instalar em Portugal.
O enquadramento social do primeiro narrador, Nuno, e da sua família é evidente; pertencem a uma família burguesa, vivem no Restelo, o bairro mais elitista da capital portuguesa, Lisboa, num quotidiano dominado pela mentira e pelo desrespeito – ele traí a sua mulher Ana com Mafalda – e que é confrontado com a situação terminal de Diogo, o patriarca da família, no leito de morte na sua mansão, na herdade situada nas proximidades de Reguengos de Monsaraz, Alentejo, e do rio Guadiana, onde os seus filhos e demais familiares se confrontam com o fim do “pai”, “aparentemente” o pai extremoso e genuinamente puro e exemplar, mas que na realidade é o latifundiário temido e autoritário, violento para os familiares e para os trabalhadores rurais, exercendo arbitrariamente a violência e o ódio, num cenário dominado pelas traições conjugais, pelas ligações familiares ilegítimas, numa violência desmesurada.
O romance ”Auto dos Danados” vai sendo construído e desenvolvido com recurso às memórias dos vários narradores, em cinco capítulos: “antevéspera do festa”, “véspera da festa”, “primeiro dia da festa”, “segundo dia da festa” e “terceiro dia da festa” - em vários períodos e espaços que se vão cruzando, no presente, no passado mais recente e no passado mais longínquo, numa interpretação e numa perspectiva individual, pensamentos por vezes desordenados e complexos de acompanhar, pela multiplicidade dos relatos dos membros familiares, num enredo fragmentado e com critérios diferenciados pelos respectivos narradores, sobre as complexas relações familiares, entre homens e mulheres, sobre os distúrbios mentais e a esquizofrenia; uma das personagens é portadora de síndrome de Down, a “mongolóide”, sem nome, e muito mais.
António Lobo Antunes desmistifica de uma forma exemplar a normal percepção de harmonia no seio das famílias burguesas, supostamente abastadas, num tom quase sempre sarcástico, violento e misógino, sobre a desagregação familiar, espiritualmente e financeiramente, num dos períodos mais conturbados da recente história de Portugal, numa analogia perfeita entre a família e o pais.
”Auto do Danados” é um excelente romance, indispensável, mas de leitura exigente e proactiva.
António Lobo Antunes - 86º Feira do Livro - Lisboa - Portugal (2016-05-28)
António Lobo Antunes, o eterno candidato ao Prémio Nobel da Literatura, proferiu as seguintes declarações sobre a entrega do prémio a Bob Dylan em 2016:
Como é que está?
A trabalhar. O que é que hei-de fazer? Não tenho mais nada para fazer...
Também estou a trabalhar. Não tenho mais nada para fazer...
(risos) Pois. Não temos mais nada para fazer, olhe.
Queria ter uma reacção sua à atribuição do Nobel ao Bob Dylan.
Não vou dizer nada. Nunca falei quando me deram prémios, não vou falar quando não me dão.
Estava a referir-me ao Bob Dylan em si.
Eu gosto.
Porquê?
Gosto das letras, gosto das músicas, acho que é muito bom.
Não fazia ideia.
Não gosta dele?
Não conheço bem.
Vale a pena ouvir. Ele é bom. E é um homem interessante.
Recorda-se de alguma música em particular?
Tem várias. (silêncio) Isso é uma coisa, outra é darem um Nobel a uma pessoa que faz canções. Mas isso não tenho nada que ter opiniões.
Sabe que está toda a gente a estranhar o prémio.
Há muita indignação, é?
É. Porque é um cantor.
Não me quero meter nisso. Normalmente não faço comentários quando dão o prémio a alguém. É muito fácil dar opiniões. Mas isso de que serve? A gente pode questionar as coisas a outro nível, mas isso não me interessa. Para mim o Prémio Nobel da Literatura não é aquilo, mas é uma opinião pessoal, posso não ter razão nenhuma. As pessoas fazem o que quiserem.
É o que as pessoas acham. Começando pelo facto de o prémio ter sido dado a um cantor.
Isso é discutível. É evidente que há grandes escritores que nunca ganharam nada. O Tolstói, tantos. Todos os prémios são aleatórios, todos os prémios são discutíveis. Dêem a quem derem, as pessoas discutem. Eu não daria, mas isso é uma opinião pessoal, não quero polémicas nem chatices nem nada. Deram àquele, pronto, não tenho que discutir. Quem sou eu para dar opiniões?
In revista Visão (13 Outubro 2016)
February 1, 2019
"What the hell is this?" Is undoubtedly the spontaneous exclamation of the reader after some 20 pages into this novel. Because at first you seem to have ended up in a fairly conventional story, where the narrator informs you that everything is happening shortly after the Carnation Revolution in Portugal (1974), in a wealthy family that feels threatened by the omnipresent communists and wants to flee to Spain, and against the background of the patriarch of the family who is dying.
Those information elements are useful, there is no doubt about that, because you regularly see references to that frame story pass by. But Lobo Antunes deliberately drowns them in a whirling multitude of voices and perspectives, some of which are recognizable, others not (or not at first sight), and in which time layers, real and imagined reality flow through each other, in a bombastic ensemble of clattering sentences that sometimes don’t seem to go anywhere. Occasionally there are passages that charm by their intimacy or their hilarity, but they alternate with gross, brutal, and absolutely degenerate situations; it is no coincidence that the words 'imbeciles', 'mongols' and 'incest' regularly fall. The cacophonic style seems to be deliberately meant to evoke the chaos of a family that feels the ground under its feet moving away. Or does Lobo Antunes just wants to indicate that life itself is so coarse, degenerate and enigmatic?
The least you can say is that this novel intrigues and that the author has a lot to offer. The references to Faulkner and Marquez certainly are not unjustified. But I cannot say that I really enjoyed the burlesque atrabilious-ness of this book, for me it was really over the edge. Perhaps this was not the best choice to get to acquainted with Lobo Antunes, or was it?
Those information elements are useful, there is no doubt about that, because you regularly see references to that frame story pass by. But Lobo Antunes deliberately drowns them in a whirling multitude of voices and perspectives, some of which are recognizable, others not (or not at first sight), and in which time layers, real and imagined reality flow through each other, in a bombastic ensemble of clattering sentences that sometimes don’t seem to go anywhere. Occasionally there are passages that charm by their intimacy or their hilarity, but they alternate with gross, brutal, and absolutely degenerate situations; it is no coincidence that the words 'imbeciles', 'mongols' and 'incest' regularly fall. The cacophonic style seems to be deliberately meant to evoke the chaos of a family that feels the ground under its feet moving away. Or does Lobo Antunes just wants to indicate that life itself is so coarse, degenerate and enigmatic?
The least you can say is that this novel intrigues and that the author has a lot to offer. The references to Faulkner and Marquez certainly are not unjustified. But I cannot say that I really enjoyed the burlesque atrabilious-ness of this book, for me it was really over the edge. Perhaps this was not the best choice to get to acquainted with Lobo Antunes, or was it?
May 23, 2008
“Act of the Damned” is an absolute lunatic novel. The disturbingly besotted and predatory air of Antunes’s work is reminiscent of dark and frenetic passages from Hunter S. Thompson, Ignacio de Loyola Brandao, Boris Vian and perhaps the creepiest bits of Roald Dahl. This is to say that the prose is unusually visceral, coarse, disorganized, playful and interested in avoiding pretention in favor of a swaggering strangeness.
A few scattered sentences like, “After endless nights of talk and drink and syringes, of God knows how many grams of pills and heroin, I return to the world at two or three in the afternoon, surrounded by your collection of old hats, the overflowing ashtrays and the smell of urine from the Siamese that struts over the covers while we sleep, I return with the weariness of a septuagenarian frog, my kidneys splitting with pain as I flounder in a swamp of algae” made me feel like I could imagine what sort of influences went into the scattershot construction of this multi-generational festival of avarice, decay and retardation.
The novel is challenging, not least of all because there are at least nine different narrators (members of the family, the family’s doctor, a hapless notary), many of them unannounced and few of them in absolute control of their chapters. A reader suddenly realizes, based on rare instances of direct address in imbedded dialogue, that someone new inhabits the first person perspective, around whose discomfort and frustration Antunes layers his ubiquitous, over-the-top prose. (He could be faulted for failing to differentiate these narrative voices more clearly.).
For long stretches, Antunes will also narrate several things at once, overlaying them in alternating sentences. Sometimes it is clear that he is doing this to show how the surroundings (usually noise, heat and squalor) are so oppressive and irritating that they literally intrude upon the happenings and at other times, it seems to a bit more haphazard and “cut up.” For instance, “ ‘Wackawackawacka,’ said my cousin in Turkish to the Saint Bernard, who immediately withdrew his submissive finger. The mongoloid finished her oatmeal in a typhoon of soggy morsels, and the maid used the torn shirt to wipe her clean before unstrapping her. The procession trampled over the already twisted, tortured lanes to the accompaniment of clarinets, trombones, and tambourines in a heart-rending display of miserable splendour. The fireworks burst into luminous flakes in the air and we only heard them once they were fading in powdery threads. ‘What are you nosing around her for?’ asked my aunt, her eyelids heavy with rage. ‘We got you that cabin and bought you the looms on the condition that you never again set foot in this house.’”
Antunes is also quite comfortable, cobbling together virtuosic sentences that, with the addition of the retards, had me thinking of a more substance-addled, more embittered and less fussy William Faulkner, “My shotgun was tucked under my armpit and my cartridge belt held four or five dangling birds that had interrupted their flight (the hounds fetched their riddled corpses) to fan my haunches, and I arrived at the bedroom door trailing dust from my boots on the carpet and smelling of gunpowder, the earth, the woods and the blood of rabbits and turtle-doves, and my wife, who didn’t look at me, was pulling dresses from the closets and laying them on the bedspread, folding blouses, gathering up her underwear and shoes, and tugging on the leather straps of the open suitcases, knowing I was watching her—my gun in hand and my navel crowned with partridges, looking like a holy card of Our Lady surrounded by murdered angels—watching her move forward and backwards and sideways in the mirrors, as if it were twelve instead of one that I’d married, until I asked, ‘What the hell’s going on?’”
I’m letting Antunes’ prose speak for itself. While it fits into the cluster of authors I mentioned at first, it is unique and will either repel a reader within five pages or make him tolerate heaps of cruelty, mockery of retards, incest, random violence, scheming and confusions. As I read the novel, I was, at times, unsure what I thought of it and unsure of whether or not I would read Antunes again. In retrospect, I may just have been too overwhelmed and off-track to enjoy it properly. Skimming it again and reviewing the passages that I marked, made me certain that I will tackle another of this man’s books.
A few scattered sentences like, “After endless nights of talk and drink and syringes, of God knows how many grams of pills and heroin, I return to the world at two or three in the afternoon, surrounded by your collection of old hats, the overflowing ashtrays and the smell of urine from the Siamese that struts over the covers while we sleep, I return with the weariness of a septuagenarian frog, my kidneys splitting with pain as I flounder in a swamp of algae” made me feel like I could imagine what sort of influences went into the scattershot construction of this multi-generational festival of avarice, decay and retardation.
The novel is challenging, not least of all because there are at least nine different narrators (members of the family, the family’s doctor, a hapless notary), many of them unannounced and few of them in absolute control of their chapters. A reader suddenly realizes, based on rare instances of direct address in imbedded dialogue, that someone new inhabits the first person perspective, around whose discomfort and frustration Antunes layers his ubiquitous, over-the-top prose. (He could be faulted for failing to differentiate these narrative voices more clearly.).
For long stretches, Antunes will also narrate several things at once, overlaying them in alternating sentences. Sometimes it is clear that he is doing this to show how the surroundings (usually noise, heat and squalor) are so oppressive and irritating that they literally intrude upon the happenings and at other times, it seems to a bit more haphazard and “cut up.” For instance, “ ‘Wackawackawacka,’ said my cousin in Turkish to the Saint Bernard, who immediately withdrew his submissive finger. The mongoloid finished her oatmeal in a typhoon of soggy morsels, and the maid used the torn shirt to wipe her clean before unstrapping her. The procession trampled over the already twisted, tortured lanes to the accompaniment of clarinets, trombones, and tambourines in a heart-rending display of miserable splendour. The fireworks burst into luminous flakes in the air and we only heard them once they were fading in powdery threads. ‘What are you nosing around her for?’ asked my aunt, her eyelids heavy with rage. ‘We got you that cabin and bought you the looms on the condition that you never again set foot in this house.’”
Antunes is also quite comfortable, cobbling together virtuosic sentences that, with the addition of the retards, had me thinking of a more substance-addled, more embittered and less fussy William Faulkner, “My shotgun was tucked under my armpit and my cartridge belt held four or five dangling birds that had interrupted their flight (the hounds fetched their riddled corpses) to fan my haunches, and I arrived at the bedroom door trailing dust from my boots on the carpet and smelling of gunpowder, the earth, the woods and the blood of rabbits and turtle-doves, and my wife, who didn’t look at me, was pulling dresses from the closets and laying them on the bedspread, folding blouses, gathering up her underwear and shoes, and tugging on the leather straps of the open suitcases, knowing I was watching her—my gun in hand and my navel crowned with partridges, looking like a holy card of Our Lady surrounded by murdered angels—watching her move forward and backwards and sideways in the mirrors, as if it were twelve instead of one that I’d married, until I asked, ‘What the hell’s going on?’”
I’m letting Antunes’ prose speak for itself. While it fits into the cluster of authors I mentioned at first, it is unique and will either repel a reader within five pages or make him tolerate heaps of cruelty, mockery of retards, incest, random violence, scheming and confusions. As I read the novel, I was, at times, unsure what I thought of it and unsure of whether or not I would read Antunes again. In retrospect, I may just have been too overwhelmed and off-track to enjoy it properly. Skimming it again and reviewing the passages that I marked, made me certain that I will tackle another of this man’s books.
July 18, 2018
Um dos romances que mais retrata a sociedade portuguesa do século XX. É a história de uma família na época Salazarista.
Representa um Portugal pobre, desfalecido, sem glória e alegria. Uma sociedade em que as mulheres são dominadas através de chibatadas e pancadaria.
Representa um Portugal pobre, desfalecido, sem glória e alegria. Uma sociedade em que as mulheres são dominadas através de chibatadas e pancadaria.
July 9, 2025
"I never want to hear another word about Portugal," my husband said as he lay back again in his mattress of bushes and plants, waiting for hungry dogs to show. The first one, equipped with a long snout, approached uncertainly. Others were barking in the hotel corridor, where the geriatric's feet periodically skipped through, nimble as the birds by the river, and I felt the dogs' wet breathing, the swiping of their paws, the sweat in their grimy fur. I thought Any minute now they'll be fighting the flies and the maggots for the dead lamb meat of my husband, chewing until they get to his seaweed entrails, whose face and expression and smile are a mystery to me, and tomorrow morning, when they knock on the door to bring in breakfast, I'll wake up to find a few scattered bones and, a little way past them, the water of the Guadiana tripping over rocks on its way to the sea.
All of the prose is like this - startling metaphorical and surreal, mixing memory and desire into a single stream of flailing imagery. Antunes' technique throughout is assured and involving: he's fond of juxtaposing lots of different conversations (sometimes set across different time periods, conjured up by associative memory, or even entirely imagined conversations) against one another, creating a polyphony of voices. This works on the level of the structure too: 10 separate narrators, each more morally bankrupt than the last, and juuuuust complicated enough in their relationships to one another that I had to draw a family tree on the front page to keep up (fun stuff!!! genuinely!!!).
I absolutely sank into this like a happy diver in the Guadiana - as dark as the novel was it was not a depressing read, honestly verging on the absurd logic of a cartoon most of the time, and consistently beautiful in its prose style. Apparently this is the most Faulknerian Antunes gets, which is fine because this was veeeery Faulknerian - but I'm very excited to read more of his excellent style and vision.
November 16, 2025
Lamento sinceramente todos aqueles que não leram nunca António Lobo Antunes. Um génio. Um daqueles nomes escassos que dá orgulho em ser-se português e, sobretudo, à língua portuguesa.
July 8, 2015
I really disliked this book. I like to read authors from the countries I visit and Atunes is my first Portuguese one. The praise on the book cover led me to believe that this was going to be a passionate family story, but I found every character to be disreputable. There was no moral center so I felt disconnected and didn't care about any of the characters. There wasn't anyone I could slightly root for. Even anti-heroes in books or movies the audience roots for, with a sense of guilt.
I don't like a lot of metaphors and similes in the books I read because I often find them illogical and interrupting to the flow of a narrative. Writing can be beautiful and deep without constant comparisons. This book is full of similes and they rarely had the effect intended. Most of them didn't make sense or mixed metaphors. Here is an example of a really bad simile,
"My sister turned on the spigot, which resembled a gaping fish-mouth, and I reached for a tentacle of soap, stretched out like a fakir on a bed of rubber nails. Bending over the the running water without touching it, I stared in amazement at the fish's continual, turbulent, imperturbable vomit" (134).
It starts out all right but then switches comparisons mid sentence, moving from an aquatic comparison to a religious one, not to mention it ends disgustingly.
The other major problem I had is the book has many narrators, mostly members of the family, the notary being an exception. Multiple narrators is common so I don't have a problem with that. My problem is with the voice and tone of the book. The characters had their own personalities, flaws and troubles, but from the narration itself they all sound the same. Everyone thinks in the same heavy metaphorical way and there is very little to differentiate from the style of the writing who is the speaker. I think if an author is using more than one narrator then the writing should reflect the different personalities and thought-processes of each narrator. Any differences were very subtle. Even when Francisco, the youngest of the narrators, talks he sounds the same. And the first narrator seems to have an inordinately long section even though he is not in the rest of the book, and is just an in-law (although the other in-law does play an important part). This first character, Nuno, is just as fucked up as the rest of the characters and may have committed two murders for no reason, if they even happened and weren't just his overworked imagination.
What kept me reading was the novel is short so it felt like I should finish it. The prose does have a certain rhythm to it that moves the reader continually onward and I can see how people would find it beautiful, especially if they like the heavy-handed metaphors. Toward the end of the book the theme of the paranoia about encroaching Communists and the need to flee to Spain with some semblance of financial well-being becomes prominent, almost making the novel worth it.
Maybe it is a translation issue, or maybe it is that my experience with Portuguese people had nothing in common with these immoral "white trash" characters who didn't care about anyone, not really even caring for themselves. But of course, 2015 is a very different cultural period for Portugal than the 1970s were.
I don't like a lot of metaphors and similes in the books I read because I often find them illogical and interrupting to the flow of a narrative. Writing can be beautiful and deep without constant comparisons. This book is full of similes and they rarely had the effect intended. Most of them didn't make sense or mixed metaphors. Here is an example of a really bad simile,
"My sister turned on the spigot, which resembled a gaping fish-mouth, and I reached for a tentacle of soap, stretched out like a fakir on a bed of rubber nails. Bending over the the running water without touching it, I stared in amazement at the fish's continual, turbulent, imperturbable vomit" (134).
It starts out all right but then switches comparisons mid sentence, moving from an aquatic comparison to a religious one, not to mention it ends disgustingly.
The other major problem I had is the book has many narrators, mostly members of the family, the notary being an exception. Multiple narrators is common so I don't have a problem with that. My problem is with the voice and tone of the book. The characters had their own personalities, flaws and troubles, but from the narration itself they all sound the same. Everyone thinks in the same heavy metaphorical way and there is very little to differentiate from the style of the writing who is the speaker. I think if an author is using more than one narrator then the writing should reflect the different personalities and thought-processes of each narrator. Any differences were very subtle. Even when Francisco, the youngest of the narrators, talks he sounds the same. And the first narrator seems to have an inordinately long section even though he is not in the rest of the book, and is just an in-law (although the other in-law does play an important part). This first character, Nuno, is just as fucked up as the rest of the characters and may have committed two murders for no reason, if they even happened and weren't just his overworked imagination.
What kept me reading was the novel is short so it felt like I should finish it. The prose does have a certain rhythm to it that moves the reader continually onward and I can see how people would find it beautiful, especially if they like the heavy-handed metaphors. Toward the end of the book the theme of the paranoia about encroaching Communists and the need to flee to Spain with some semblance of financial well-being becomes prominent, almost making the novel worth it.
Maybe it is a translation issue, or maybe it is that my experience with Portuguese people had nothing in common with these immoral "white trash" characters who didn't care about anyone, not really even caring for themselves. But of course, 2015 is a very different cultural period for Portugal than the 1970s were.
July 7, 2014
A left-wing takeover of Portugal frames the events in this book, but aside from the opening and closing pages, the collapse of a family is the focus.
Thrown into this toxic political mix is a family that is morally, spiritually and intellectually bankrupt. The mansion seems to be falling apart around the dying patriarch. His insane children play at trains around his bedpan. And the only rational members of the family--who also happen to be the most morally bankrupt--circle to divide his fortune.
This is very experimental fiction that Antunes is providing here. Multiple perspectives come to play in the book, and the reader is never sure just who it is that's speaking. I often made it to the third or fourth page of a chapter before figuring out--oh, this is the character! And there were many places where the perspective shifted within chapter and within paragraph.
Another challenge the book provides is there are very few names used. The brother-in-law, the railroad engineer, the daughter. I think only four characters' names are used regularly, although others are provided indirectly through direct address.
This is a challenging read but also ultimately a good one.
Thrown into this toxic political mix is a family that is morally, spiritually and intellectually bankrupt. The mansion seems to be falling apart around the dying patriarch. His insane children play at trains around his bedpan. And the only rational members of the family--who also happen to be the most morally bankrupt--circle to divide his fortune.
This is very experimental fiction that Antunes is providing here. Multiple perspectives come to play in the book, and the reader is never sure just who it is that's speaking. I often made it to the third or fourth page of a chapter before figuring out--oh, this is the character! And there were many places where the perspective shifted within chapter and within paragraph.
Another challenge the book provides is there are very few names used. The brother-in-law, the railroad engineer, the daughter. I think only four characters' names are used regularly, although others are provided indirectly through direct address.
This is a challenging read but also ultimately a good one.
July 7, 2018
This irreverent and almost indescribably wacky novel is initially set in September 1975 in the Portuguese capital of Lisbon, less than 18 months after the Carnation Revolution spelled the end of the fascist Estado Novo, the beginning of a democratic government, and the end of colonial rule and civil wars in Angola, Mozambique and elsewhere, as wealthy conservative families saw their worth plummet. The motley cast of characters consist of the younger relatives and in laws of a dying wealthy patriarch who lives in the Alentejo, as they seek to claim his substantial inheritance before they flee to Spain, which was still under the dictatorial rule of Francisco Franco. The novel consists of narratives from different family members, and from them the decadence and depravity of each of them is revealed, with frequent references to infidelity, incest and other immoral behaviors. The characters are absurdly funny but neither believable nor worthy of sympathy, and because I could not relate to any of them I struggled my way through this novel, even though I'm a fan of Antunes's work.
November 7, 2017
Em 'O Som e a Fúria', William Faulkner percorre a decadência de uma família do sul dos Estados Unidos, através do ponto de vista de cada uma das personagens. Começando pelo marido da neta do patriarca moribundo, passando pela filha, nora, netos e pelo genro, Faulkner revela o estado financeiro e social de uma família habituada a viver à custa de quem trabalha, ao ser confrontada com uma herança de dívidas e o comunismo a bater à porta.
Semelhanças à parte, António Lobo Antunes cria uma imagem vivida duma época não tão distante dos nossos dias, que faz parte do imaginário popular português como um conjunto de roubos legalizados ou como uma romântica justiça por séculos de servidão. Num cenário idílico, rumo de milhares de turistas todos os anos nos dias de hoje, um povo alheio à maior parte das convulsões políticas que estariam a decorrer na cabeça dos caciques, festeja a morte do touro na arena.
Semelhanças à parte, António Lobo Antunes cria uma imagem vivida duma época não tão distante dos nossos dias, que faz parte do imaginário popular português como um conjunto de roubos legalizados ou como uma romântica justiça por séculos de servidão. Num cenário idílico, rumo de milhares de turistas todos os anos nos dias de hoje, um povo alheio à maior parte das convulsões políticas que estariam a decorrer na cabeça dos caciques, festeja a morte do touro na arena.
April 29, 2020
It wasn’t an easy read, both because of Antunes’ complicated but impressive literary style, which was a first for me, and because I read it in English. It was an introduction to a Faulknerlike, to be followed by Faulkner himself. This is the story of a horrible (or horrific) family and its members none of which are to be liked. There’s violence, incest, sickness (physical, emotional and ethical) all over the place. Though I detested the characters, the family, the core of the story, I was in awe of how it was portrayed back and forth through time, with reality versus fantasy.
This was recommended to me by the staff of Livrario Lello in Porto, Portugal for a contemporary but not so internationally known Portugese writer while travelling there, so bravo to them, too.
I hope it’s translated into Turkish one day so I can read it in my native language again.
This was recommended to me by the staff of Livrario Lello in Porto, Portugal for a contemporary but not so internationally known Portugese writer while travelling there, so bravo to them, too.
I hope it’s translated into Turkish one day so I can read it in my native language again.
November 20, 2017
“[…] Portugal […] não existia. Era uma ficção burlesca dos professores de Geografia e de História, que criaram rio e serras e cidades governadas por sucessivas dinastias de valetes de cartas, a que se sucederam, após meia dúzia de estampidos chochos de barraca de tiro, sujeitos de barbicha e lunetas aprisionados em retratos ovais, observando o Futuro na miopia severa dos eleitos, para tudo se diluir na paz branca sem relevo nem contornos do salazarismo […]”
“[…] todos se consideravam com direito a nada num país onde nada é o que geralmente se possuí e coisa nenhuma o que os defuntos nos deixam ao deixar-nos, além de dívidas e uma saudade zangada em relação ao lugar vago na mesa e ao riso do retrato, o qual vai perdendo substância com a agonia da memória.”
“[…] todos se consideravam com direito a nada num país onde nada é o que geralmente se possuí e coisa nenhuma o que os defuntos nos deixam ao deixar-nos, além de dívidas e uma saudade zangada em relação ao lugar vago na mesa e ao riso do retrato, o qual vai perdendo substância com a agonia da memória.”
June 12, 2008
I was disappointed in this book. For one, it is utterly predictable: it reads like a Bunuel film. The upper class is pious and immoral and destroy themselves while blaming the Communists. Sure, there are plenty of cases where this is so, but in the end...so what? Antunes does not really add anything to this tired old Socialist meme. And his literary device of multiple voices comes accross as formula: a way of fleshing out an implausible and not-very-well-thought-out story. Sure, the reader is apt to want the whole of the family taken out back and shot, but there is almost nothing human to them. They are cardboard cutouts. Not a single one of the characters has anything to offer.
August 13, 2015
Take some Faulkner or your favorite novel of Southern Decay™, move it to Portugal and add a generous dose of modern despicability. Then garnish with literary tricks. The book follows a wealthy family with a dying patriarch on the eve of cultural revolution. The characters, while all terrible, are decidedly memorable. The tricks, including changing perspectives and non-linear time are well crafted in that they shake things up without being a significant barrier. Particularly well done is how characters move into and out of fantasy or memory. The transitions are fluid yet discernible.
September 29, 2015
A book that wallows in the ugly with predictable incestuous entanglements and related grotesquery
March 15, 2021
Num percebi um caralho! É capaz de ser culpa minha, que queria despachar isto rápido... Mas vai-se a ver e é culpa do autor, que me fez querer despachar isto rápido! Uma das duas deve de ser
January 19, 2025
An engaging novel about the downfall of a wealthy Portuguese family that is morally and financially bankrupt. The novel is set in the 1970s, just after the Carnation Revolution of 1974, and the family is aiming to flee first to Spain and then to Brazil. The writing is filled with over the top metaphors that are a pleasure to read! The story is told by a number of characters in the family over a three day period.
The patriarch of the family is dying in a rundown rural Portuguese mansion and his heirs are pulling the place apart looking for his wealth and items of value to sell. it appears the patriarch has squandered away his money on gambling, prostitutes, and medicines for two members of the family, one a mongoloid, the other a simpleton.
Other members of the family live depraved lives including rape, incest, violence, theft and adultery.
This is my sixth Antunes novel and I have enjoyed them all. My favorite being ‘An Explanation of the Birds’.
This book was first published in Portuguese in 1985.
The patriarch of the family is dying in a rundown rural Portuguese mansion and his heirs are pulling the place apart looking for his wealth and items of value to sell. it appears the patriarch has squandered away his money on gambling, prostitutes, and medicines for two members of the family, one a mongoloid, the other a simpleton.
Other members of the family live depraved lives including rape, incest, violence, theft and adultery.
This is my sixth Antunes novel and I have enjoyed them all. My favorite being ‘An Explanation of the Birds’.
This book was first published in Portuguese in 1985.
February 6, 2021
A escrita deste tipo deixa-me danado. A narrativa, história, motivo? Que se foda; quem procura uma boa história nos livros do Lobo Antunes não os aprendeu a ler ou não teve a sorte de encontrar um pedaço de si estampado numa página da sua obra. Meus amigos, se procuram uma boa história, rejubilem: certamente terão um Dumas perdido numa estante qualquer.
March 18, 2025
Antonio Lobo Antunes is an author I have come to very late, why I missed him back in the 1980's and 90's when so many of his great novels, like this one, were translated into English, I can't explain though better late than never is completely true in this case.
I see no point in repeating the story line of this novel, you can find it here on Goodreads and elsewhere, in any case those details tell you nothing of what the novel is about - which is the implosion of a society so steeped in moral bankruptcy that it is extraordinary it has survived as long as it has. What is revealed is not simply its rottenness but how its fetid nauseousness has poisoned everyone, young and old, corrupted and destroyed them and their futures because the corruptions of the past keep on living with a horrifying resilience.
Lobo Antunes has not written a USA Southern Gothic novel a la Faulkner, McCullers or Capote - the insistent comparison, indeed reduction of Lobo's to an American cliched trope is perhaps one of the more glaringly insulting and incredibly ignorant if not racist things I have read on Goodreads. His work emerges from a very specific milieu, period and political situation - that doesn't mean it does not speak to those outside its circumstances. Do I need to belabour the point that Leo Tolstoy, Charles Dickens and Gunter Grass are equally specific and equally universal?
Although not specific to this novel a huge part of Lobo Antunes work is rooted in the colonial nightmare that consumed Portugal under Salazar and his successors. Those wars and the racism and folly de grandeur that they fostered along with the lies of all societies spokespersons, government, church, etc. is what reduced Portugal to the farcical state it was in when the revolution finally toppled the house of cards, really bubbles, there was nothing real or substantial, it wasn't a case of the actors scuttling off with the props but the revelation that the props had disappeared long before and the actors were naked ghosts performing in an empty auditorium.
Lobo Antunes is one of the great 20th century European authors - is part of the Western Canon? who knows and who cares. He is great writer and one I will be reading more of.
I see no point in repeating the story line of this novel, you can find it here on Goodreads and elsewhere, in any case those details tell you nothing of what the novel is about - which is the implosion of a society so steeped in moral bankruptcy that it is extraordinary it has survived as long as it has. What is revealed is not simply its rottenness but how its fetid nauseousness has poisoned everyone, young and old, corrupted and destroyed them and their futures because the corruptions of the past keep on living with a horrifying resilience.
Lobo Antunes has not written a USA Southern Gothic novel a la Faulkner, McCullers or Capote - the insistent comparison, indeed reduction of Lobo's to an American cliched trope is perhaps one of the more glaringly insulting and incredibly ignorant if not racist things I have read on Goodreads. His work emerges from a very specific milieu, period and political situation - that doesn't mean it does not speak to those outside its circumstances. Do I need to belabour the point that Leo Tolstoy, Charles Dickens and Gunter Grass are equally specific and equally universal?
Although not specific to this novel a huge part of Lobo Antunes work is rooted in the colonial nightmare that consumed Portugal under Salazar and his successors. Those wars and the racism and folly de grandeur that they fostered along with the lies of all societies spokespersons, government, church, etc. is what reduced Portugal to the farcical state it was in when the revolution finally toppled the house of cards, really bubbles, there was nothing real or substantial, it wasn't a case of the actors scuttling off with the props but the revelation that the props had disappeared long before and the actors were naked ghosts performing in an empty auditorium.
Lobo Antunes is one of the great 20th century European authors - is part of the Western Canon? who knows and who cares. He is great writer and one I will be reading more of.
May 15, 2018
As a Luso-American, I've been trying to read books by Portuguese writers other than Saramago. I want to learn more about the culture and the history. I want to hear Portuguese voices that are less well-known and more local in their interests. To be honest, Saramago has a little too much magical realism for me as well and I don't think he always addresses the elephant in the room which is the Salazar legacy.
This is the second Antunes book I've read and, god, what a bitter experience. He may not be as violent as Cormac McCarthy, but his world view is not much better. He writes at a level far above me with perspectives changing in mid-paragraph at one point.
I find his books compelling because of the characters. I have a dark view of the world too and I like seeing characters that are more complex than the sanitized ones I watched on telenovelas growing up. I am also a Faulkner fan and I share Antunes' interest in decaying families..
Antunes is a also doctor and I can see that in his descriptions of bodily fluid, odors, and stuff I don't even want to mention. Sometimes, it was a little much.
I don't know if I'll keep reading him, but I appreciate his view of the Portuguese and their history. I will probably do so, particularly because he has novels about Angola and that is a topic I sorely want to know more about.
This is the second Antunes book I've read and, god, what a bitter experience. He may not be as violent as Cormac McCarthy, but his world view is not much better. He writes at a level far above me with perspectives changing in mid-paragraph at one point.
I find his books compelling because of the characters. I have a dark view of the world too and I like seeing characters that are more complex than the sanitized ones I watched on telenovelas growing up. I am also a Faulkner fan and I share Antunes' interest in decaying families..
Antunes is a also doctor and I can see that in his descriptions of bodily fluid, odors, and stuff I don't even want to mention. Sometimes, it was a little much.
I don't know if I'll keep reading him, but I appreciate his view of the Portuguese and their history. I will probably do so, particularly because he has novels about Angola and that is a topic I sorely want to know more about.
June 6, 2016
Nepoznanica koja me je oduševila. Toliko da opraštam čak i taj nepopravljivo gust i neodmjeren tekst. Stil je vrlo originalan, i usprkos ogromnom protoku, u svakom se slovu vidi majstorska ruka velikog romanopisca. Tragedija koja neodoljivo vuče na Faulknera u najboljoj formi, sa dozom južnog temperamenta. Ma genijalno.
November 29, 2009
Complex narrative. Will reread at some point in the future.
January 20, 2013
Não foi nada do que previa. Não é apenas linguagem tratada e pura que faz um bom livro, é preciso consistência narrativa e coerência. Não existiu neste romance
September 18, 2017
É impossível ficar indiferente, à escrita e imaginação, do autor. Obrigado.
August 25, 2025
A depraved, disgusting, hallucinatory, phantasmagoric, unbelievable, carnal, abusive, manipulative, incestuous, decaying, unsettling, violent, and absolutely hellish nightmare. Imagine the worst attributes of Faulkner's southern gothic mythos but transported to Portugal and magnified by the morally disfiguring power of wanton greed and lust. This book contains one of the most stomach-churning groups of demonic humans I've ever read, and yet somehow Antunes' beautiful, opaque, nearly inscrutable stream-of-consciousness prose raises this filthy mire to the level of high art. It requires close attention and focus to parse out the threads and characters but it is rewarding for the attentive reader brave enough to wade into this dark cesspit of humanity's absolute worst.
I will be reading more Antunes.
I will be reading more Antunes.
July 18, 2016
acho que fiz uma boa descoberta com Auto dos Danados. Cada capítulo do livro é narrado por um personagem diferente, quase todos sem nome (ele fala de “o dentista”, “a mongoloide”, “a casada com o dos bondes”, “o engenheiro” etc) e sem qualquer introdução — você tem que pescar depois de iniciado o capítulo quem é mesmo que está falando. Conta de uma família portuguesa falida, que se reúne durante as festas do povoado porque o avô está moribundo. A partir desse reencontro, vai se desenrolando as misérias da família: um casamento falido, onde ambos os cônjuges sabem dos amantes um do outro; um tio que já dormiu com todas as mulheres da família — e do povoado —, incluindo sua cunhada débil mental (de quem tem uma filha, e com quem acaba também tendo uma filha); casamentos por interesse; o patriarca que forjou a morte da própria esposa porque esta o abandonara; a mãe que abandona os filhos e o marido e vai morar no Rio de Janeiro com um surfista e por aí vai.
O realismo e o exagero com que as misérias da família são narradas de forma crua e seca mostra como gerações e gerações podem se manter sem amor, sem cuidados e sem nada a se apegar, a não ser o dinheiro que eles esperam depois da morte do velho. Mas o que resta da fortuna que o velho mesmo dilapidou em anos de jogos, bebidas e mulheres acaba sendo gasto em tratamentos para os dois filhos com problemas mentais e no tratamento do próprio pai. Com a aproximação da Revolução dos Cravos, a família, afogada em dívidas e com medo dos comunistas, foge na mesma noite da morte do velho para a Espanha.
A cena da morte do patriarca é narrada em conjunto com a cena da morte do touro (está havendo uma tourada, que fecha os festejos que estão ocorrendo na vila) e, pra mim, é o ponto alto do romance, onde todos os personagens vão se mostrando profundamente aliviados com isso. Não há máscaras para cair, todos estão ali com suas misérias e usuras expostas, sem esconder nada de ninguém. O período narrado é de grande catarse pra todos, onde não têm nada a esconder nem jogos a jogar. É tudo exposto, de forma feita, na sua miséria psicológica e mesmo material, de gente vivendo em subúrbios fedorentos e no meio de relações de traição e descontentamento.
“Está morto, disse eu à família a compor a gola do pijama do velho, a arrecadar os instrumentos, a preparar-me para abandonar o quarto, descer as escadas, enfrentar os perdigueiros, tornar a Reguengos na ambulância do hospital. Está morto, disse eu, arrastem-no da arena pelos cabos que lhe seguram os cornos, amarrem-lhe as patas e levem-no e dividam-lhe a carne e vendam-na no talho, podem embebedar-se dois ou três dias com o dinheiro do finado, esse bicho enteiriçado e grosso, sem majestade alguma, que sangrava e que sangrava ainda.”
Li a versão que achei na Internet, mas estou muito interessada em comprar o livro físico pra ler de novo.
O realismo e o exagero com que as misérias da família são narradas de forma crua e seca mostra como gerações e gerações podem se manter sem amor, sem cuidados e sem nada a se apegar, a não ser o dinheiro que eles esperam depois da morte do velho. Mas o que resta da fortuna que o velho mesmo dilapidou em anos de jogos, bebidas e mulheres acaba sendo gasto em tratamentos para os dois filhos com problemas mentais e no tratamento do próprio pai. Com a aproximação da Revolução dos Cravos, a família, afogada em dívidas e com medo dos comunistas, foge na mesma noite da morte do velho para a Espanha.
A cena da morte do patriarca é narrada em conjunto com a cena da morte do touro (está havendo uma tourada, que fecha os festejos que estão ocorrendo na vila) e, pra mim, é o ponto alto do romance, onde todos os personagens vão se mostrando profundamente aliviados com isso. Não há máscaras para cair, todos estão ali com suas misérias e usuras expostas, sem esconder nada de ninguém. O período narrado é de grande catarse pra todos, onde não têm nada a esconder nem jogos a jogar. É tudo exposto, de forma feita, na sua miséria psicológica e mesmo material, de gente vivendo em subúrbios fedorentos e no meio de relações de traição e descontentamento.
“Está morto, disse eu à família a compor a gola do pijama do velho, a arrecadar os instrumentos, a preparar-me para abandonar o quarto, descer as escadas, enfrentar os perdigueiros, tornar a Reguengos na ambulância do hospital. Está morto, disse eu, arrastem-no da arena pelos cabos que lhe seguram os cornos, amarrem-lhe as patas e levem-no e dividam-lhe a carne e vendam-na no talho, podem embebedar-se dois ou três dias com o dinheiro do finado, esse bicho enteiriçado e grosso, sem majestade alguma, que sangrava e que sangrava ainda.”
Li a versão que achei na Internet, mas estou muito interessada em comprar o livro físico pra ler de novo.
April 9, 2022
I know Antunes, the Portuguese author and former surgeon, from his 1979 book, Os Cus de Judas, or The Land at the End of the World (an aside: it is an interesting choice for the title in translation, because the original title translates directly as 'The Ass of Judas'), which was an angry and scathing condemnation of the senselessness and brutality of the Angolan War of Independence, in which he served as a doctor in the Portuguese army.
In many ways Act of the Damned is a continuation of that scathing condemnation, but this time the senselessness and brutality is materialized in a family of the Portuguese gentry. Taking place after the Portuguese Carnation Revolution—itself directly caused by the Angolan War— and right on the cusp of the (ultimately failed) communist (not socialist, as stated in the writeup) coup of 1975. Within this historical timeline the disintegration of the family mirrors the disintegration of the former ruling class.
Portrayed as violent and in-bread degenerates (for example the grandson Francisco, a starving heroin addict who lives with his middle-aged lover "on [Lisbon's] Praça Street," which is repeated many times—and having been on that very street exactly two weeks ago as of this writing—I bought this book while in Lisbon—I can attest the only buildings on Praça Street are Portuguese government ministry offices, including finance, internal affairs, and agriculture, and at the time of the dictatorship the ministry of war—see the image below, Praça do Comércio is just visible along the water, the sliver of a gray square on the left), the family's fate is hardly tragic. You could even say it was inevitable, right from the beginning.
But all that aside, I can't pass by without mentioning the novel's style. As an example of what you could call hallucinatory realism (which I confess I stole from some critic or other who was describing the works of Mo Yan, but it fits well here), it is simply stunning, carrying itself relentlessly, like a strategy for an attack, from the first sentence until the last. In all honesty this book would only be half of what it is without it. Even though I was a little slow to warm up to it, overall this work is simply outstanding.
In many ways Act of the Damned is a continuation of that scathing condemnation, but this time the senselessness and brutality is materialized in a family of the Portuguese gentry. Taking place after the Portuguese Carnation Revolution—itself directly caused by the Angolan War— and right on the cusp of the (ultimately failed) communist (not socialist, as stated in the writeup) coup of 1975. Within this historical timeline the disintegration of the family mirrors the disintegration of the former ruling class.
Portrayed as violent and in-bread degenerates (for example the grandson Francisco, a starving heroin addict who lives with his middle-aged lover "on [Lisbon's] Praça Street," which is repeated many times—and having been on that very street exactly two weeks ago as of this writing—I bought this book while in Lisbon—I can attest the only buildings on Praça Street are Portuguese government ministry offices, including finance, internal affairs, and agriculture, and at the time of the dictatorship the ministry of war—see the image below, Praça do Comércio is just visible along the water, the sliver of a gray square on the left), the family's fate is hardly tragic. You could even say it was inevitable, right from the beginning.
But all that aside, I can't pass by without mentioning the novel's style. As an example of what you could call hallucinatory realism (which I confess I stole from some critic or other who was describing the works of Mo Yan, but it fits well here), it is simply stunning, carrying itself relentlessly, like a strategy for an attack, from the first sentence until the last. In all honesty this book would only be half of what it is without it. Even though I was a little slow to warm up to it, overall this work is simply outstanding.
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