Cardoso writes a kind of fado novel about the past and present of his homeland Timor Leste, asserting the existence of the docile and faithful colonial nation of Timorese, looking with hope to Portugal, but constantly neglected by the latter.
A very depressing and darkly written novel. A confusing narrative, extremely one-dimensional, sexist (total lack of female characters) and, especially in the last third of the novel, sounding like a news report. ( )

Read as part of my 'Read around the World' challenge: I found this short (150p) memoir about East Timor surprisingly difficult to follow in places. When the narrative opens, the country is still ruled by Portugal, "the mother country now turned wicked stepmother". Rival factions are rising up, some in favour of the Portugal connection, others wanting to ally with neighbouring Indonesia or become outright independent. Young people see a scholarship to study in Portugal as the way forward...
Ancient superstitions rub shoulders with Catholicism, we get an idea of the countryside and of life for the young. And at moments the author is indeed quite lyrical in his writing.
But overall I found it somewhat forgettable... ( )

I read this for a personal account of East Timor, and it not only gave me everything I could have hoped for (insight into old beliefs and traditions, a sense of East Timor under Portuguese rule, a sense of what it was like to be in Portugal while the Indonesian invasion and occupation were occurring and what expats got up to), but it was also just beautifully written, so full of feeling, so emotionally evocative, that I was left really moved by it. It's framed by memories and thoughts about his father, who, in the present of the book's writing, is suffering from old-age dementia, and the sense of love and loss there is beautiful too.

Here's a flavor of it. First, a quote that shows the beauty of the language:

After his long absence, his son had been struck dumb. They gave him the position of chief of the suku as a way of forcing him to speak. They did not understand that he had left behind himall the tricks in which men wrap their intentions. He wante to invent a new language without those traps and obstacles. The old man only realized this later, when he began sailing at night and was the only one awak. He read the language of the stars, of colours and of the sea. And now his son was right there in front of him, talking. They understood each other's words, pauses and silences.

Thoughts on revolution and everyday life:

Whenever reality killed one of my illusions, it was immediately replaced by another, like a bead on a rosary. I used to walk by the river at the hour when others were leaving the city, especially if it was raining and the square was empty. I would watch the path followed by people leaving their ofices and heading for home where there domestic duties awaited them. I was not bound by routine, but I longed for it. In the end, war, heroism and betrayals were all extreme acts carried out in order to attain precisely that kind of normality. Remaining on the outside could only lead to madness.

It's interesting, he mentions growing up with all the people who became revolutionary leaders. About one guy, he says,

He was no longer the Platonist who used to try to persuade catechumens of the need for resignation, arguing the existence of an extraterrestrial paradise; now this hard-line militant wanted to impose a belief in an earthly paradise, tested and proved fruitful in other latitudes under a different name and open to all those who had been marginalized ... Secretly, I noted that he remained immune to happiness.

He recalls Xanana Gusmão, the current prime minister of East Timor, as a soccer-playing youth sprawled on the soccer pitch. It reminded me of how in any generation, the people involved in a certain something will tend to know one another--like how all the lost-generation authors knew each other, or how the fantasy and science-fiction-writing community is so tight. So too with revolutionary youth.

Here's a moving quote from when he asks his dad, who had been in East Timor all through the Indonesian predations but who then joined him in Portugal, what it had been like:

Sometimes I got the feeling that my father wanted to talk about what had happened in the bush. On the maubere radio I had heard news about the Indonesian campaigns and about the atrocities committed. He had been there and I longed to know the truth. Acts of heroism and betrayal, people dying and abandoned, suicides and murders. But he was travelling further back in time, avoiding my questions and mixing up the war against the Japanese with the war of Manufahi. When I tried to broach the subject of his painful experiences in the bush, he would shut up like a rock. Then he would weep silently. Like morning dew falling on stone.

And here, a small gesture that means so much:

The dead fish left behind by the retreating tide lay intact on the sand. With no one to eat them, they were swimming onto dry land. He picked them up, one by one, and put them back in the water. He was not trying to restore them to life. He knew they were dead. As a former nurse, he had a very clear idea about what death was. The river was behaving like time, discarding the weakest ones along its shores. It simply horrified him to see something dying out of its natural element.

Beautiful book (and very, very good for retroactive research for Pen Pal and future research for who knows what?)
( )

I read this for a personal account of East Timor, and it not only gave me everything I could have hoped for (insight into old beliefs and traditions, a sense of East Timor under Portuguese rule, a sense of what it was like to be in Portugal while the Indonesian invasion and occupation were occurring and what expats got up to), but it was also just beautifully written, so full of feeling, so emotionally evocative, that I was left really moved by it. It's framed by memories and thoughts about his father, who, in the present of the book's writing, is suffering from old-age dementia, and the sense of love and loss there is beautiful too.

Here's a flavor of it. First, a quote that shows the beauty of the language:

After his long absence, his son had been struck dumb. They gave him the position of chief of the suku as a way of forcing him to speak. They did not understand that he had left behind himall the tricks in which men wrap their intentions. He wante to invent a new language without those traps and obstacles. The old man only realized this later, when he began sailing at night and was the only one awak. He read the language of the stars, of colours and of the sea. And now his son was right there in front of him, talking. They understood each other's words, pauses and silences.

Thoughts on revolution and everyday life:

Whenever reality killed one of my illusions, it was immediately replaced by another, like a bead on a rosary. I used to walk by the river at the hour when others were leaving the city, especially if it was raining and the square was empty. I would watch the path followed by people leaving their ofices and heading for home where there domestic duties awaited them. I was not bound by routine, but I longed for it. In the end, war, heroism and betrayals were all extreme acts carried out in order to attain precisely that kind of normality. Remaining on the outside could only lead to madness.

It's interesting, he mentions growing up with all the people who became revolutionary leaders. About one guy, he says,

He was no longer the Platonist who used to try to persuade catechumens of the need for resignation, arguing the existence of an extraterrestrial paradise; now this hard-line militant wanted to impose a belief in an earthly paradise, tested and proved fruitful in other latitudes under a different name and open to all those who had been marginalized ... Secretly, I noted that he remained immune to happiness.

He recalls Xanana Gusmão, the current prime minister of East Timor, as a soccer-playing youth sprawled on the soccer pitch. It reminded me of how in any generation, the people involved in a certain something will tend to know one another--like how all the lost-generation authors knew each other, or how the fantasy and science-fiction-writing community is so tight. So too with revolutionary youth.

Here's a moving quote from when he asks his dad, who had been in East Timor all through the Indonesian predations but who then joined him in Portugal, what it had been like:

Sometimes I got the feeling that my father wanted to talk about what had happened in the bush. On the maubere radio I had heard news about the Indonesian campaigns and about the atrocities committed. He had been there and I longed to know the truth. Acts of heroism and betrayal, people dying and abandoned, suicides and murders. But he was travelling further back in time, avoiding my questions and mixing up the war against the Japanese with the war of Manufahi. When I tried to broach the subject of his painful experiences in the bush, he would shut up like a rock. Then he would weep silently. Like morning dew falling on stone.

And here, a small gesture that means so much:

The dead fish left behind by the retreating tide lay intact on the sand. With no one to eat them, they were swimming onto dry land. He picked them up, one by one, and put them back in the water. He was not trying to restore them to life. He knew they were dead. As a former nurse, he had a very clear idea about what death was. The river was behaving like time, discarding the weakest ones along its shores. It simply horrified him to see something dying out of its natural element.

Beautiful book (and very, very good for retroactive research for Pen Pal and future research for who knows what?)
( )

Timor-Leste.

Despite an explanatory introduction, I found this somewhat hard to follow. Cardoso's language is at times lyrical and nuanced, but the narrative slid around a bit and I'd suddenly find myself reading about a new topic without realizing that the focus had shifted. Cardoso's tone is dreamy and somewhat trance-inducing. While ostensibly a memoir of Cardoso's childhood, there are many points of foreshadowing of the declaration of independence and subsequent invasion by Indonesia. I missed most of these until I read a book on East Timor. ( )