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My Father's Wives

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Wikipedia article




'My Father's Wives' is a novel by the Angolan author Jos Eduardo Agualusa published in 2008 by Arcadia Books (London, England). It was translated by Daniel Hahn from Portuguese: 'As Mulheres do Meu Pai', published in 2007 by Editora Lngua Geral (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) and Publicaes Dom Quixote (Lisbon, Portugal).

Upon his death, the famous Angolan composer Faustino Manso left seven widows and eighteen children. His youngest daughter, Laurentina, a filmmaker, tries to reconstruct the late musician's turbulent life. In 'My Fathers Wives', reality and fiction run side by side, the former feeding into the latter. However, in the territories Agualusa crosses, fiction plays a part in reality too. The four characters in the novel which the author is writing as he travels accompany him from Luanda, the Angolan capital to Benguela and Namibe (now Momedes). They cross the Namibian sands and their ghost towns, reaching Cape Town. They carry on to Maputo, then Quelimane beside the Bons Sinais River, and then to the island of Mozambique. They cross landscapes that border dreams, landscapes from which here and there the strangest characters emerge. 'My Fathers Wives' is a novel about women, music and magic. These pages herald the rebirth of Africa, a continent afflicted by terrible problems but blessed with a talent for music, by the ever-renewed strength of its women and the secret power of ancient gods.[http://www.agualusa.pt/cat.php?catid=28&idbook=56&alt_lang=1 Official site of Jos Eduardo Agualusa]

Reception and criticism



In 'The Independent', Boyd Tonkin called the work "rich in historical sidelights and deft character-sketches." He continues, "A radiant humour and humanity speeds his novel through its picaresque twists and turns."Tonkin, Boyd. "Happiness in spite of history." Rev. of 'My Father's Wives' by Jos Eduardo Agualusa. 'The Independent' 30 March 2009. Print.

In 'The Guardian', Jennie Erdal cites "an artful mix of fact, reportage, politics, poetry and personal confession, not to mention mountainous dollops of sheer unadulterated invention - all dispatched in short episodic chapters and musical, rhythmic prose." She praises further: "Agualusa, master of multiple perspectives, remains impressively in control. The result is a giant melting pot, exuding intoxicating fumes of love and death that permeate the exotic, chaotic sweep of southern Africa."Erdal, Jennie. "Across the continent." Rev. of 'My Father's Wives' by Jos Eduardo Agualusa. 'The Guardian' 20 December 2008. Print.

References





Category:2007 novels

Category:Books by Jos Eduardo Agualusa

Category:Picaresque novels

Category:Novels set in Angola

Category:Novels set in Mozambique

Category:Angolan novels


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