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2015 Longlist

The Tuner of Silences

Translated from the Portuguese by David Brookshaw

ABOUT
THE BOOK

Mwanito Vitalício was eleven when he saw a woman for the first time, and the sight so surprised him he burst into tears.

Mwanito’s been living in a big-game park for eight years. The only people he knows are his father, his brother, an uncle, and a servant. He’s been told that the rest of the world is dead, that all roads are sad, that they wait for an apology from God. In the place his father calls Jezoosalem, Mwanito has been told that crying and praying are the same thing. Both, it seems, are forbidden.

The eighth novel by The New York Times-acclaimed Mia Couto, The Tuner of Silences is the story of Mwanito’s struggle to reconstruct a family history that his father is unable to discuss. With the young woman’s arrival in Jezoosalem, however, the silence of the past quickly breaks down, and both his father’s story and the world are heard once more.

The Tuner of Silences was heralded as one of the most important books to be published in France in 2011 and remains a shocking portrait of the intergenerational legacies of war.

ABOUT
THE AUTHOR Mia
Couto

Mia Couto, born in Beira, Mozambique, in 1955, is one of the most prominent writers in Portuguese-speaking Africa. After studying medicine and biology in Maputo, he worked as a journalist and headed several Mozambican national newspapers and magazines. Couto has been awarded many important literary prizes, including the 2014 Neustadt International Prize for Literature, the Premio Camões, the Prémio Vergílio Ferreira, the Prémio União Latina de Literaturas Românicas, and others.

He lives in Maputo, where he works as a biologist.

Mia Couto, born in Beira, Mozambique, in 1955, is one of the most prominent writers in Portuguese-speaking Africa. After studying medicine and biology in Maputo, he worked as a journalist and headed several Mozambican national newspapers and magazines. Couto has been awarded many important literary prizes, including the 2014 Neustadt International Prize for Literature, the Premio Camões, the Prémio Vergílio Ferreira, the Prémio União Latina de Literaturas Românicas, and others.

He lives in Maputo, where he works as a biologist.

NOMINATING LIBRARY COMMENTS

By meshing the richness of African beliefs into the western framework of the novel, Mia Couto creates a mysterious and surreal epic (novel) and characters.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Date published
27/09/2012
Author
Publisher
Biblioasis
Translator
David Brookshaw
Translation
Translated from the Portuguese by David Brookshaw

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