Background
Milton Hatoum was born on August 19, 1952, in Manaus, Brazil. He is the son of Hassan Ibrahim and Naha Assi Hatoum. During his childhood, Milton lived with the culture, religion and language of Arabs and African Jews.
(Introducing a major new voice in Brazilian letters. Set a...)
Introducing a major new voice in Brazilian letters. Set among a Lebanese immigrant community in the Brazilian port of Manaus, The Brothers is the story of identical twins, Yaqub and Omar, whose mutual jealousy is offset only by their love for their mother. But it is Omar who is the object of Zana's Jocasta-like passion, while her husband, Halim, feels her slipping away from him, as their beautiful daughter, RGnia, makes a tragic claim on her brothers' affection. Vivid, exotic, and lushly atmospheric, The Brothers is the story of a family's disintegration, of a changing city and the culture clash between the native-born inhabitants and a new immigrant group, and of the future the next generation will make from the ruins.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0374141185/?tag=2022091-20
2002
(Onze anos depois da publicação de"Relato de um Certo Orie...)
Onze anos depois da publicação de"Relato de um Certo Oriente", Milton Hatoum retoma os temas do drama familiar e da casa que se desfaz. "Dois Irmãos" é a história de como se constroem as relações de identidade e diferença numa família em crise. O enredo desta vez tem como centro a história de dois irmãos gêmeos - Yaqub e Omar - e suas relações com a mãe, o pai e a irmã. Moram na mesma casa Domingas, empregada da família, e seu filho. Esse menino - o filho da empregada - narra, trinta anos depois, os dramas que testemunhou calado. Buscando a identidade de seu pai entre os homens da casa, ele tenta reconstruir os cacos do passado, ora como testemunha, ora como quem ouviu e guardou, mudo, as histórias dos outros. Do seu canto, ele vê personagens que se entregam ao incesto, à vingança, à paixão desmesurada. O lugar da família se estende ao espaço de Manaus, o porto à margem do rio Negro: a cidade e o rio, metáforas das ruínas e da passagem do tempo, acompanham o andamento do drama familiar. Prêmio Jabuti 2001 de Melhor Romance.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/8535908331/?tag=2022091-20
2006
(Emilie, the matriarch, is on her deathbed. Returning to h...)
Emilie, the matriarch, is on her deathbed. Returning to her childhood home to say goodbye, her granddaughter becomes enveloped in memories, as family and friends gather round to tell their own tales, one by one. We hear of how Uncle Hanna first left Lebanon for Brazil early in the twentieth century; of Soraya Angela, the illegitimate deaf-mute child whose short life was blighted by fear and prejudice; of Uncle Emir and his solitary walk that ended at the bottom of a river; of Hakim's wranglings with the Arabic language; of the two unnameable, fiery-tongued brothers; of the German photographer and constant friend Dorner, roaming Manaus with his Hasselblad; and at the center of it all lies Emilie: loving, interfering, luminous. Flowing like the Amazon through East and West, city and jungle, life and death, Tale of A Certain Orient has all the magnetism and lush beauty of its Brazilian setting. Emilie, the matriarch, is on her deathbed. Returning to her childhood home to say goodbye, her granddaughter becomes enveloped in memories, as family and friends gather round to tell their own tales, one by one. We hear of how Uncle Hanna first left Lebanon for Brazil early in the twentieth century; of Soraya Angela, the illegitimate deaf-mute child whose short life was blighted by fear and prejudice; of Uncle Emir and his solitary walk that ended at the bottom of a river; of Hakim's wranglings with the Arabic language; of the two unnameable, fiery-tongued brothers; of the German photographer and constant friend Dorner, roaming Manaus with his Hasselblad; and at the center of it all lies Emilie: loving, interfering, luminous. Flowing like the Amazon through East and West, city and jungle, life and death, Tale of A Certain Orient has all the magnetism and lush beauty of its Brazilian setting. Emilie, the matriarch, is on her deathbed. Returning to her childhood home to say goodbye, her granddaughter becomes enveloped in memories, as family and friends gather round to tell their own tales, one by one. We hear of how Uncle Hanna first left Lebanon for Brazil early in the twentieth century; of Soraya Angela, the illegitimate deaf-mute child whose short life was blighted by fear and prejudice; of Uncle Emir and his solitary walk that ended at the bottom of a river; of Hakim's wranglings with the Arabic language; of the two unnameable, fiery-tongued brothers; of the German photographer and constant friend Dorner, roaming Manaus with his Hasselblad; and at the center of it all lies Emilie: loving, interfering, luminous. Flowing like the Amazon through East and West, city and jungle, life and death, Tale of A Certain Orient has all the magnetism and lush beauty of its Brazilian setting.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/074756907X/?tag=2022091-20
2007
(Mundo is a rebel - the embittered offshoot of a rich fami...)
Mundo is a rebel - the embittered offshoot of a rich family, whose artistic vocation clashes with his father's dynastic plans. Ashes of the Amazon charts his determined flight from the fraught centre of his family's wealth - the Vila Amazonia plantation - through Rio de Janeiro, and then to the effervescent worlds of 1970s Berlin and London. In Ashes of the Amazon, Hatoum takes to heart Flaubert's injunction to write 'the moral history of his generation', with extraordinary results. This is a beautiful, mature and involving novel from one of the most important South American writers of his time.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0747596727/?tag=2022091-20
2009
(Cinzas do Norte e o relato de uma longa revolta e do esfo...)
Cinzas do Norte e o relato de uma longa revolta e do esforco de compreende-la. Na Manaus dos anos 1950 e 60, dois meninos travam uma amizade que atravessara toda a vida. De um lado, Olavo (Lavo), o narrador, menino orfao, criado pelos tios, cresce a sombra da familia do melhor amigo, Raimundo Mattoso (Mundo), de berco aristocratico. A fim de realizar suas inclinacoes artisticas, ou quem sabe para investigar suas angustias mais profundas, Mundo engalfinha-se numa luta contra o pai, a provincia, a moral dominante e, para culminar, os militares que tomam o poder em 1964. A rebeldia e a posterior fuga do rapaz ampliam o universo romanesco, que alcanca a Europa da irrequieta decada de 1970, de onde Mundo manda sinais para Lavo, ainda preso a cidade natal. Por versoes e revelacoes que se cruzam ou desencontram, sem jamais chegar a esgotar o enigma da vida de seus protagonistas, Hatoum escreve, neste aclamado romance,uma historia moral de sua geracao.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/8535917225/?tag=2022091-20
2010
(The setting for this magical fable is Eldorado, the Encha...)
The setting for this magical fable is Eldorado, the Enchanted city that inhabited the fevered dreams of European navigators and conquistadors, but eluded all attempts to find it on the map. Some have linked it to Manaus in the Amazon Basin, and it is here that Arminto Cordovil lives with his father Amando in a white mansion. Theirs is a relationship full of passion and limitless ambition. Separating father and son is a remarkable cast of characters, from Angelina, the dead mother, to Denisio, the infernal boatman, and at the centre, Dinaura, a girl who betwitches Arminto and dreams of Eldorado... Orphans of Eldorado is a rich and magical fable that beautifully captures the atmosphere of the steamy, lush Amazonian world.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1847673007/?tag=2022091-20
2012
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0957152841/?tag=2022091-20
2013
(Como disse uma vez o escritor argentino Julio Cortazar, o...)
Como disse uma vez o escritor argentino Julio Cortazar, o conto e uma pequena e perfeita esfera verbal que guarda uma unica semente a ponto de eclodir. A semente pode ser de qualquer natureza um lugar, um rosto, um episodio , contanto que as maos habeis do bom contista saibam torna-la o ponto central a partir do qual se forma a esfera narrativa. Desse feitio, justamente, sao os contos que Milton Hatoum reuniu em A cidade ilhada: relances da experiencia vivida recolhidos em tramas brevissimas, de diccao enxuta, em que tudo ganha nitidez maxima e maximo poder de iluminacao. As sementes desses contos nao poderiam ser mais diversas: a primeira visita a um bordel em Varandas da Eva; uma passagem de Euclides da Cunha em Uma carta de Bancroft; a vida de exilados em Barbara no inverno ou Encontros na peninsula; o amor platonico por uma inglesinha em Uma estrangeira da nossa rua. Com mao discreta e madura, Hatoum trabalha esses fragmentos da memoria ate que adquiram, sem que se adivinhe como ou quando, outro carater: frutos do acaso e da biografia pessoal, eles afinal se mostram como imagens exemplares do curso de nossos desejos e fracassos. Uns e outros, alias, respondem pela rede subterranea que amarra entre si os contos de A cidade ilhada. Se o desejo sob a forma do amor, da literatura ou da viagem leva os personagens a dilatar o raio de sua acao e a transpor as barreiras da infancia e da moral, da classe e da provincia, estes mesmos elementos nao se dao por vencidos e apenas aguardam a hora certa para se abater sobre os herois como uma fatalidade erotica ou historica que os traz de volta a um centro imovel: para onde vou, Manaus me persegue. Esferas perfeitas ou espirais vertiginosas? Breves como sao, as historias de Milton Hatoum guardam em si a mesma potencia expansiva e explosiva que o leitor ja conhecia desde Dois irmaos e Cinzas do Norte.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/8535924418/?tag=2022091-20
2014
Milton Hatoum was born on August 19, 1952, in Manaus, Brazil. He is the son of Hassan Ibrahim and Naha Assi Hatoum. During his childhood, Milton lived with the culture, religion and language of Arabs and African Jews.
Hatoum received his education at State University of Sao Paulo with a diploma in urban architecture in 1977. He also earned a Master of Arts degree at University of Sorbonne in Paris in 1983. He became a Doctor in Literary Theory at State University of Sao Paulo in 1998.
After concluding his studies, Hatoum taught French language and literature at the Federal University of Amazonas (UFAM) and at the University of California, Berkeley. He has written four novels: Relato de um Certo Oriente (Tale of a Certain Orient), Dois Irmãos (The Brothers), Cinzas do Norte (Ashes of the Amazon). He also published several short stories in newspapers and magazines in Brazil and abroad. Now Hatoum works as a freelance writer, based in San Paulo. Hatoum is also a translator for Brazilian edition of Salman Rushdie’s Haroun and the Sea of Stories.
(The setting for this magical fable is Eldorado, the Encha...)
2012(Como disse uma vez o escritor argentino Julio Cortazar, o...)
2014(Onze anos depois da publicação de"Relato de um Certo Orie...)
2006(Mundo is a rebel - the embittered offshoot of a rich fami...)
2009(Cinzas do Norte e o relato de uma longa revolta e do esfo...)
2010(Introducing a major new voice in Brazilian letters. Set a...)
2002(Emilie, the matriarch, is on her deathbed. Returning to h...)
2007
