Product Description

Lisbon. 1936. Ricardo Reis is a doctor, returning to his native Portugal from Brazil after 16 years away. But what kind of doctor is he? His companions include: the ghost of the poet Pessoa; a girl with a paralysed hand; and the hotel chambermaid, who slips into his bed at night.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #75075 in Books
• Published on: 1998-09-17
• Original language: Portuguese
• Binding: Paperback
• 384 pages

Customer Reviews

Saramago's Best
This is my favourite of all Saramago's novels. First of all because I love the poetry of Fernando Pessoa and this book evolves around Pessoa and one of his famous heteronyms, Ricardo Reis. This is already a fantastic begining: the novel's main character is not a living person, but a fictionalized person made by some other author! This being Saramago, the set of the story has a strong social and ideological background. In this matter, this book is a metaphor of the rising of the portuguese fascist regime. Then there is Saramago's ironic sense of humour: this a very funny serious book!
As I read the book in portuguese, I don't know how well Saramago's rich and detailed speech translates in other languages, since some of the attraction of this book remains in the hedonistic plasure of reading a so wonderfully writen story!

Fantastic!
This story is captivating. Saramago is a wonderful writer! The plot does seem to lag at times but you must continue reading as it is definately worth it. Quite thought provoking with typical Saramago questions about time and reading. I do recommend, however, that you familiarize yourself with the poet Fernando Pessoa as this poet is one of the characters in the novel. Enjoy!

Long, but rewarding
It has taken me a long time to finish this as it becomes quite hard to put it down and pick it up again. This is because Saramago's writing style is a unique one; he is often rambling, paragraphs continuing for pages upon end and seem to never really result in anything,which can make it hard to get into the mood for a Saramgo read.

But I found I got the most of this book by reading in sittings, rather than in short blocks, and it is thoroughly rewarding: poetic, philosophical, political. The atmosphere and scenes that Saramago creates is (are) fantastic. Only the fact that it is fairly unaccessible at first is why I can't give this 5 stars. Having read the Gospel According to Jesus Christ, I'd recommend that first.