So Many People, Mariana - by Maria Judite de Carvalho (Paperback)

About the Book

"A collection of Maria Judite de Carvalho's work between 1959 and 1967: twenty-six short stories about men and women trapped by a culture that values them as workers but not as people"--

Book Synopsis

Long discounted by a literary culture that actively rejected women's writing, Maria Judite de Carvalho's biting and bitterly funny work has since exploded across the world. Collecting the entirety of her short works written between 1959 and 1967, when the Salazar dictatorship and the rigid edicts of the Catholic church reigned, the stories in So Many People, Mariana might as well have been written today. These are tough, unflinching accounts of women trapped by a culture that values them as workers or wives but not as people. And if they do escape their circumstances, they are, more often than not, irrevocably punished by the world.

So Many People, Mariana is an introduction to a major international writer at the height of her power. Translated by the renowned Margaret Jull Costa, Carvalho leads readers into the dark of life under patriarchal capitalism, writing "as precisely and without sentiment as an autopsy" (New York Review of Books).

Review Quotes

"Carvalho's rich imagery and simple style allows for a welcome breadth of vantage points...The tales stretch in length from a few pages to brief novellas, and it is in the longer stories that the writer's talent for probing the conflict of emotions comes to the fore."
--The Times Literary Supplement

"A tour de force of domestic horrors, placidly delivered with sharp observation....There are surprises and twists that demonstrate a command of form, irony, and humor, but no happy or satisfying endings. What emerges from these narratives is work that feels inherently political, a kaleidoscopic look at a society languishing under repression."
--Full Stop

"A definitive collection of stories by a Portuguese master of the form...The stories that make up this remarkable volume are united by their quiet intensity, their commitment to internal turmoil, and their enduring interest in the lives, hopes, and miseries that are unique to women."
--Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"Melancholic, contemplative, and often heartbreaking."
--Foreword Reviews

"Carvalho's story collection about ordinary women struggling to find their purpose is yet another gift to Anglophone readers. In stark, unsentimental prose, the late Portuguese literary powerhouse studies class, society, and gender with surgical precision."
--The Millions (One of the Most Anticipated Books of 2023)

"These stories are bold and unsparing, quietly devastating. A fearless exploration of longing and the claustrophobia of loneliness."
--Kayla Maiuri, author of Mother in the Dark

"Maria Judite de Carvalho's writing comes out of restriction and confinement, both personal and political. But as I read her stories, I find her way of looking so unsparingly into our shared human darkness brings me comfort and awe and at times even makes me laugh out loud."
--Karolina Ramqvist, author of The Bear Woman