Portuguese Works

Luís de Camões Author of Portugal’s best-known piece of literature, the epic poem The Lusiads, written in 1572 and celebrating the Portuguese Era of Discoveries.

Eça de Queiroz (1845–1900) is one of Portugal’s best-known authors. His most popular work is The Maias, about a wealthy Lisbon family in the early 20th century. Other titles include The Tragedy of the Street of Flowers and The Crime of Father Amaro.

Eugénio Lisboa has edited a number of books of poetry and short stories, including The Anarchist Banker and Other Portuguese Stories, and Professor Pfiglzz and His Strange Companion.

Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) is second only to Camões in the list of illustrious Portuguese poets. He wrote under other names: Alberto Caeiro, Ricardo Reis and Álvaro de Campos, transforming his style with each. His Book of Disquiet contains his disturbing meditations around Chiado.

José Saramago (1922–2010) received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1998, hastening the translation of his works into English. Journey to Portugal is a good place to start, a wonderful travelogue full of detailed insight. Baltasar and Blimunda and The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis are also recommended.

Miguel Torga’s autobiography, The Creation of the World, recalls his Trás-os-Montes childhood, a boyhood in Brazil and return to qualify as a doctor and work in his native village, where Tales from the Mountain and More Tales from the Mountain are set.

Books about Portugal

Backwards Out of the Big World: A Voyage into Portugal by Paul Hyland. Following in the steps of Henry Fielding from Lisbon to the Spanish border, Hyland brings a new insight into the country.

Birdwatching Guide to the Algarve by Kevin Carlson. Where to go and what to see.

A Concise History of Portugal by David Birmingham, CUP, 2003. A standard, with many illustrations.

In the Lands of the Enchanted Moorish Maiden, edited by Mandi Gomez. These 11 “exhibition trails” on Moorish Portugal cover “Christianised” mosques, palaces, fortifications and urban settlements between Coimbra and Algarve.

The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon by Richard Zimler. Set in Lisbon in 1506, when “New Christian” Jewish converts were being murdered.

Prince Henry The Navigator: A Life by Peter Russell. A portrait of the king as Renaissance man.

The Portuguese Seaborne Empire 1415–1825 by C.R. Boxer. An enthralling work full of awkward truths and compelling anecdotes.

Portugal’s Struggle for Liberty by Mário Soares. By Portugal’s most eminent political figure – a long-serving president and a key personality in post-revolution events.

The Portuguese: The Land and Its People by Marion Kaplan. A revised and updated edition to the revealing, readable and entertaining portrait.

A Small Death in Lisbon by Robert Wilson. Excellent novel of life in Portugal.

Portuguese Voyages 1498–1663: Tales from the Great Age of Discovery, edited by Charles David Ley. Contemporary accounts of the great sea voyages.

Republican Portugal, a Political History 1910–1926 by Douglas L. Wheeler. A fascinating account of the period between monarchy and dictatorship when Portugal endured 45 successive governments.

The Taste of Portugal by Edite Vieira. Recipes, history and folklore.

Hunting Midnight by Richard Zimler. After the success of The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon (see above), Zimler has set this fictional tale of bigotry and betrayal in 18th- and 19th-century Porto.

The Migrant Painter of Birds by Lidia Jorge. A beautifully crafted poetic novel by this feminist novelist about a girl from a Portuguese farming family and her absent father.

Other Insight Guides

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