Welcome

The first books I read – comics not included – as far as I can remember, was the Enid Blyton series The Famous Five and The Secret Seven. One of the first books I read was O Rapaz de Bronze by Sophia de Mello Breyner. I can’t remember how old I was. 

Ferdinand Céline is a master. Death on Credit Aka Death on the Installment Plan, I read three times. Scott Fitzgerald is another great reference to me. The Great Gatsby, for instance, I consider to be a perfect novel, if such a thing as perfection really exists. Miguel Cervantes and his Dom Quixote, another perfect masterpiece. From António Lobo Antunes and his glorious lifetime work, I remember the first one that puzzled me: An Explanation of the Birds. Not so long ago I read Ulysses by James Joyce and I understood all its greatness. I also like Philip K. Dick, William Gibson, William Burroughs and Neil Gaiman in the speculative fiction genre. Douglas Coupland, Chuck Palahniuk, Bret Easton Ellis and Irvine Welsh are all great voices of our time, for their freshness, originality and excellence.

However, I don't know if it's just the books that influence my writing. Literature feeding only on itself is a kind of absurd cannibalism. I know this is pretentious, but I try to insert in my texts the parody, humor and nonsense of Tarantino's movies; the confused labyrinths of the human mind that Dalí transposed onto canvas; the loneliness, the alienation and that standby posture in Hopper's paintings; music, whether pop, rock or Jazz, is also always present in my texts.  

It is difficult to write well in any language, especially a language that is not your mother tongue. Furthermore, due to bureaucratic issues, I only had one year of English lessons at school (9th grade). The English I learned was through cinema, television and music. At one point, I wondered, why not write in English? It is a challenge and the possibilities for failure are enormous. And then I concluded that it was easier to do it than not to do it.

I can't tell. Portuguese is my mother tongue and that's why I feel more comfortable writing in Portuguese.

However, the English language is surprisingly elastic and versatile. It is a fabulous language to express ourselves through writing. It allows you to say many things in a few words.