José Saramago

José de Sousa Saramago <a href="/facts/Military_Order_of_Saint_James_of_the_Sword/Idv2HBBk">GColSE</a> <a href="/facts/Order_of_Cam%25C3%25B5es/ATTMktL9">GColCa</a> (European Portuguese: [ʒuˈzɛ ðɨ ˈso(w)zɐ sɐɾɐˈmaɣu]; 16 November 1922 – 18 June 2010) was a <a href="/facts/Portuguese_people/1nLGh91a">Portuguese</a> writer. He was the recipient of the <a href="/facts/1998_Nobel_Prize_in_Literature/rAXb1t97">1998 Nobel Prize in Literature</a> 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 can be seen as <a href="/facts/Allegory/RKXvafFK">allegories</a>, commonly present <a href="/facts/Subversion/PS53X6dN">subversive</a> perspectives on historic events, emphasizing the <a href="/facts/Theopoetics/lzPrYGy4">theopoetic</a> human factor. In 2003 <a href="/facts/Harold_Bloom/qgS4fgQR">Harold Bloom</a> described Saramago as "the most gifted novelist alive in the world today" and in 2010 said he considers Saramago to be "a permanent part of the <a href="/facts/Western_canon/2skJ4h7f">Western canon</a>", while <a href="/facts/James_Wood_(critic)/2XnPtU2y">James Wood</a> praises "the distinctive tone to his fiction because he narrates his novels as if he were someone both wise and ignorant."
More than two million copies of Saramago's books have been sold in Portugal alone and his work has been translated into 25 languages. A proponent of <a href="/facts/Libertarian_communism/2rDylfkT">libertarian communism</a>, Saramago criticized institutions such as the <a href="/facts/Catholic_Church/rJ4F4gqH">Catholic Church</a>, the <a href="/facts/European_Union/6GYcR8qM">European Union</a> and the <a href="/facts/International_Monetary_Fund/tPSTWWS4">International Monetary Fund</a>. An <a href="/facts/Atheism/patUWN1f">atheist</a>, he defended <a href="/facts/Love/00rcNAfh">love</a> as an instrument to improve the <a href="/facts/Human_condition/trY462FK">human condition</a>. In 1992, the <a href="/facts/Government_of_Portugal/Hqdgl4aa">Government of Portugal</a> under Prime Minister <a href="/facts/An%25C3%25ADbal_Cavaco_Silva/vUsmx71p">Aníbal Cavaco Silva</a> ordered the removal of one of his works, <a href="/facts/The_Gospel_According_to_Jesus_Christ/wdvDYoAc">The Gospel According to Jesus Christ</a>, from the <a href="/facts/Aristeion_Prize/4RAql3wV">Aristeion Prize</a>'s shortlist, claiming the work was religiously offensive. Disheartened by this political <a href="/facts/Censorship/gwTgKVuv">censorship</a> of his work, Saramago went into exile on the Spanish island of <a href="/facts/Lanzarote/9C8GJSts">Lanzarote</a>, where he lived alongside his Spanish wife <a href="/facts/Pilar_del_R%25C3%25ADo/gYY2fDt9">Pilar del Río</a> until his death in 2010.
Saramago was a founding member of the National Front for the Defense of Culture in Lisbon in 1992.

José Saramago open-in-new

José Saramago