It is through words that she seeks to pass on messages, thoughts, confidences and stories that stick in people’s memories. Lídia Jorge is one of the leading names in Portuguese writing. She has won numerous awards, including the Luso-Spanish Art and Culture Prize, the Jean Monet Prize, the Grand Prix of Lieratura dst and the FIL Prize for Literature in Romance Languages of Guadalajara – the latter in 2020. From her birthplace, the Algarve, she has brought the simplicity of the words and, with them, she continues to write novels that mark generations. The writer, who spent time as a teacher in the warm lands of Angola and Mozambique during the colonial war, is, in Portugal, an household name in arts and literature.
If you could choose, what would be the two moments that have most marked the country and the world in the last 20 years?
The most important thing that has happened in the last twenty years was announced by Salmon Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses, published in 1989. That book announced that a time of mutual intolerance was coming. The concrete mark of that state of mind would materialise in the attacks of September 11, 2001, which took place in the United States of America. That day changed the face of the world - the relationship between countries was never the same again. The West understood that the balance of power with the other regions of the globe would change profoundly, and the open war between the various powers would create a new world, the world in which we live – an insecure world, made up of regional wars fought simultaneously, with the host of ills that we know today. Our country, relatively removed from that conflict, lives, however, submerged in the same global wave. Among us, we should also mention the way in which the sovereign debt crisis hit us from 2008. The IMF intervention, with all that it meant in terms of revealing how Northern Europe despised Southern Europe, and how the Monetary Union had been designed to strengthen some at the expense of others, has left its after-effects. It has taken a long time to overcome. I would say that one of the best news is recent – already after Brexit, Europe has united to fight the pandemic and resume development. In the midst of it all, this is a sign of hope. Usula von der Leyen, today, is more than the face of a woman.
Professionally, what has been the most decisive moment for you in these two decades?
There have been several gratifying moments. Among them, I would highlight the film adaptation of A Costa dos Murmúrios in 2004. Margarida Cardoso’s film was a great adaptation of my book. It enhanced its reading and interpretation. It drew the attention of the younger generation to the recent history of our country. This film continues to be shown, especially at festivals and in university venues, all over the world.
In your opinion, what would be the most urgent change that the country and the world need to make in the next 20 years?
It would be to change the economic paradigm and of distribution of wealth as societies become digitalised. But this will not happen if we do not change the way we value humanistic culture alongside scientific culture. Only humanistic culture will be able to give the dimension of the fundamental values of fraternity and the preservation of the human typology that makes us beings of creativity and fantasy. Beings that travel and meet with others. Beings in awe of the wonders of nature and of life.
If you could choose, what would be the two moments that have most marked the country and the world in the last 20 years?
The most important thing that has happened in the last twenty years was announced by Salmon Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses, published in 1989. That book announced that a time of mutual intolerance was coming. The concrete mark of that state of mind would materialise in the attacks of September 11, 2001, which took place in the United States of America. That day changed the face of the world - the relationship between countries was never the same again. The West understood that the balance of power with the other regions of the globe would change profoundly, and the open war between the various powers would create a new world, the world in which we live – an insecure world, made up of regional wars fought simultaneously, with the host of ills that we know today. Our country, relatively removed from that conflict, lives, however, submerged in the same global wave. Among us, we should also mention the way in which the sovereign debt crisis hit us from 2008. The IMF intervention, with all that it meant in terms of revealing how Northern Europe despised Southern Europe, and how the Monetary Union had been designed to strengthen some at the expense of others, has left its after-effects. It has taken a long time to overcome. I would say that one of the best news is recent – already after Brexit, Europe has united to fight the pandemic and resume development. In the midst of it all, this is a sign of hope. Usula von der Leyen, today, is more than the face of a woman.
Professionally, what has been the most decisive moment for you in these two decades?
There have been several gratifying moments. Among them, I would highlight the film adaptation of A Costa dos Murmúrios in 2004. Margarida Cardoso’s film was a great adaptation of my book. It enhanced its reading and interpretation. It drew the attention of the younger generation to the recent history of our country. This film continues to be shown, especially at festivals and in university venues, all over the world.
In your opinion, what would be the most urgent change that the country and the world need to make in the next 20 years?
It would be to change the economic paradigm and of distribution of wealth as societies become digitalised. But this will not happen if we do not change the way we value humanistic culture alongside scientific culture. Only humanistic culture will be able to give the dimension of the fundamental values of fraternity and the preservation of the human typology that makes us beings of creativity and fantasy. Beings that travel and meet with others. Beings in awe of the wonders of nature and of life.
