I have the feeling I should have read some of Pessoa’s work before
actually starting this book. Then again, my mother tried and found him utterly
unreadable, and I kind of trust her blindly when it comes to literature (and,
sort of, life in general I guess). The book is as beautifully written as it
gets. Yet, my problems with anything remotely magical-realistic very much remain.
Again, I probably should have read this book ten years ago.
Ricardo Reis is an endearing character much like Antonio Tabucchi’s Pereira is (or is it just the Portuguese
atmosphere that surrounds the characters that makes me put the two together?),
but if you have to patiently accept your death in a dream-like passage, I would
suggest going through the corn in a field in Iowa with Shoeless Joe Jackson,
rather than walking with Fernando Pessoa to his graveyard.
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