José Saramago

Manual of Painting and Calligraphy is a novel by Nobel Prize-winning author José Saramago. It was first published in 1977. An English translation by Giovanni Pontiero was published in 1993.

When King and Church exercise absolute power what happens to the dreams of ordinary people? In early eighteenth century Lisbon, Baltasar, a soldier who has lost a hand in battle, falls in love with Blimunda, a young girl with visionary powers. From the day that he follows her home from the auto-da-fe where her mother …