About the Author

Jose Saramago (Azinhaga, 1922-Tias, Lanzarote, 2010) es uno de los escritores portugueses mas conocidos y apreciados en el mundo entero. En Espana, a partir de la primera publicacion de El ano de la muerte de Ricardo Reis, en 1985, su trabajo literario recibio la mejor acogida de los lectores y de la critica. Otros titulos importantes son Manual de pintura y caligrafia, Levantado del suelo, Memorial del convento, Casi un objeto, La balsa de piedra, Historia del cerco de Lisboa, El Evangelio segun Jesucristo, Ensayo sobre la ceguera, Todos los nombres, La caverna, El hombre duplicado, Ensayo sobre la lucidez, Las intermitencias de la muerte, El viaje del elefante, Cain, Claraboya y Alabardas. Alfaguara ha publicado tambien Poesia completa, Cuadernos de Lanzarote I y II, Viaje a Portugal, el relato breve El cuento de la isla desconocida, el cuento infantil La flor mas grande del mundo, el libro autobiografico Las pequenas memorias, El Cuaderno, Jose Saramago en sus palabras, un repertorio de declaraciones del autor recogidas en la prensa escrita, El ultimo cuaderno y Que hareis con este libro. Teatro completo. Recibio el Premio Camoens y el Premio Nobel de Literatura.

www.josesaramago.org

Reviews

With breathtaking imagination, acclaimed Portuguese author Saramago (1922-2010), winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1998, revels in biblical themes for his final novel. When Cain, the first-born son of Adam and Eve, murders his brother in rebellion against God, God shares in the guilt ("you gods should...take the blame for all the crimes committed in your name," Cain argues) and makes Cain "a fugitive and a vagabond upon the earth." Cain's travels across a barren landscape lead him to a lusty tryst with Lilith and the witnessing, or altering, of many key events of the Old Testament (the building of the Tower of Babel; the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah). God appears often and is defined less by his perfection than his faults; He is morally ambiguous, "can't bear to see anyone happy," and doesn't understand his powerlessness in preventing Cain's meddling. Rounding out the narrative are angels who circumvent God's will, visions of the urban modernity that the future holds, an ironic description of Darwinian evolution, and God himself touting the heliocentric theory that will cause something of a ruckus five centuries on. Cain's vagabond journey builds to a stunning climax that, like the book itself, is a fitting capstone to a remarkable career. (Oct. 6) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.