Status Updates From The History of the Siege of...

"Raimundo Silva consults his watch, if Maria Sara does not ring within the half hour, he will telephone her, How are you, my love, and she will reply, Alive, and he will say, It’s a miracle."

-Saramago, Jose. The History of the Siege of Lisbon (pg. 283)

"Switch on the light, she said, I want to know if this is real."

-Saramago, Jose. The History of the Siege of Lisbon (pg. 262)

"IT IS GENERALLY CONSIDERED a show of unsurpassable bravura when a man condemned to death himself gives the firing squad the order to shoot, and even the most peaceful or cowardly of us, attended by favourable circumstances, at some time must have dreamed of this glorious demise, especially if someone survived to tell the tale, for glories without anyone to narrate them are valued less."

-Saramago, Jose

"RAIMUNDO SILVA’S MOTIVE for not telephoning Maria Sara was as simple as it was tortuous, a statement which gives the immediate impression of not being very precise, inasmuch as these adjectives should be applied with greater rigour to the reasoning with which the aforesaid motive was obliged to conform."

-Saramago, Jose. The History of the Siege of Lisbon (pg. 202)

"DURING THOSE FIRST DAYS after he had thrown away the dyes which for years had concealed the ravages of time, Raimundo Silva, like an ingenuous sower waiting to see the first shoot break through, examined the roots of his hair, day and night, with obsessive interest, morbidly relishing his anticipation of the shock he would almost certainly get once the natural hairs began to appear amongst the dyed ones."

"We could debate for hours about this historic phrase, for Raimundo Silva could swear that the words she spoke just then were different, and no less historic, It is not yet time."

-Saramago, Jose. The History of the Siege of Lisbon (pg. 150)

"Now Raimundo knows why the crusaders refused to help the Portuguese to besiege and capture the city, and he is about to return home to write The History of the Siege of Lisbon."

-Saramago, Jose. The History of the Siege of Lisbon (pg. 117)

"Raimundo Silva looked and looked again, the universe murmuring beneath the rain, dear God, such sweet and gentle sorrow, may we never be without it, not even in moments of happiness."

-Saramago, Jose. The History of the Siege of Lisbon (pg. 100)

"THE LETTER WHICH Raimundo Silva wrote to the author of The History of the Siege of Lisbon contained the necessary quantum satis of excuses and a subtle touch of discreet humour which the cordial relations between the sender and the addressee permitted without any abuse of confidence,"

-Saramago, Jose. The History of the Siege of Lisbon (pg. 84)

"...the perfect simile of death that each one of us goes through life preparing for and for which life itself serves as a protective cocoon, a propitious womb and ferment for cultivation."

Saramago, Jose. The History of the Siege of Lisbon (pg. 63)

"thus it is written and has come to be accepted as true, although different, what we would call false has come to prevail over what we would call true, falsehood has replaced the truth, and someone would have to narrate the history anew, and how."

-Saramago, Jose. The History of the Siege of Lisbon (pg. 38)

"Between the hammer and the anvil we are a red-hot iron, which has been beaten so much that the heat is extinguished."

Saramago, Jose. The History of the Siege of Lisbon (pg. 12)

"So you believe, Sir, that history is real life, Of course, I do, I meant to say that history was real life, No doubt at all, What would become of us if the deleatur did not exist, sighed the proof-reader."

Saramago, Jose. The History of the Siege of Lisbon (pg. 5)