The Silence / O Silêncio
The Silence is a love story, and the story of a silence torn open. A dialogue between Afonso, a famous middle-aged surgeon, and the young Lídia, who becomes his lover and frees him from a conventional, frustrating marriage. Lídia speaks about herself, about her mother, Lavínia, and about her restless way of looking at the world. But what Lídia tells him is exactly what Afonso does not want to hear.
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THE SILENCE
A milestone of post 1994 Portuguese fiction.
EDUARDO PRADO COELHO, JORNAL DE LETRAS
One of the best debuts in Portuguese fiction in recent time. Her first novel has been praised, sold out, awarded prizes. Her words are never squandered.Her writing is dense,never too much or too little, flawlessly measured.
CLARA FERREIRA ALVES, JORNAL DE LETRAS
The Silence is written in a prose of unusually high quality in recent Portuguese literature; with each rereading we are left with the feeling that “we can only translate what we think through distant resemblances, as if the true meaning were slipping away from us.” It is now up to other readers to take pleasure in reading and rereading T.G.’s book, to fill the “silence” with echoes, to prove that “literature has not been turned into silence,” has not become “merely immanent,” that words are not left “hemmed in, blocked,” and that instead there is born in us a “desire to sing.”
PAULA MORÃO, EXPRESSO
So far, without a doubt the best book of 1981. One of the books I have loved most in recent years.
Mª TERESA HORTA, REVISTA MULHERES
With great force, T.G. made her debut with this novel in 1981. Quite justly, the critical reception was triumphant and quickly took on the superlative tone of canonisation. From 1981 to 1995 the book went through four editions. Twelve years later comes the fifth. (…) There was a great risk that it might have become a crystallised, weakened object. But it has passed this trial by fire and reaches us intact.
ANTÓNIO GUERREIRO, EXPRESSO
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Czech Republic
Mlčení(O Silêncio), transl. Lada Weissová, Prague, Torst, 2009
German
Das Schweigen (O Silêncio), transl. Karin von Schweder-Schreiner, Munich Frauenbuchverlag, 1987
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Prémio P.E.N. Clube Português de Narrativa, 1981
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O Silêncio é uma história de amor e de um silêncio rasgado. Um diálogo entre Afonso, um cirurgião famoso de meia-idade, e a jovem Lídia, que se torna sua amante e o liberta de um casamento convencional e frustrado. Lídia fala de si, de sua mãe, Lavínia, do seu modo inquieto de olhar o mundo. Mas o que Lídia conta é exactamente o que Afonso não quer ouvir.