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The Spanish writer Arturo Pérez-Reverte published on Tuesday the Portuguese translation of “A History of Spain”, where he assures that it was a “historical error” that Felipe II did not take the capital of Spain to Lisbon, and unite the two countries.
Speaking to the Lusa agency in Madrid, the author confesses that this “is not a historian’s book”, and that he intends “to approach history with ordinary people with humor and in an informal way.”
Arturo Pérez-Reverte claims to be “very satisfied” with the translation of his work into Portuguese, and stresses that Iberia must be a unique space, instead of having two countries behind each other “.
“The Spain of the 16th century should have installed the capital in Lisbon, so that the two empires were one,” insisted the 67-year-old former journalist, a war reporter, who since the late 1980s has dedicated himself exclusively to writing novels .
In his book, Pérez-Reverte writes that “Filipe II committed […] one of the biggest mistakes “and, instead of” taking the capital to Lisbon – ancient and stately – and dedicating oneself to singing fados to look at the Atlantic and the possessions of America, […] barricaded himself in the center of the peninsula [Ibérica], in his native monastery of El Escorial, spending the money that came from the Portuguese-Spanish overseas possessions “.
“Even now, it is very sad that we do not act in a federated way”, as if we were an “egalitarian and solidary federation”, capable of facing “better” the countries of northern Europe, laments the author.
In another chapter, Pérez-Reverte writes that “João I de Castela, married to a Portuguese princess heir to the throne, was about to deliver the Iberian coup and unite the two kingdoms”, but “the grandparents of Pessoa and Saramago gave him a A good load of hits in the battle of Aljubarrota ”.
The author criticizes that, little by little, the discipline of History is disappearing from school plans, which is leading young people to “become easy prey for unscrupulous politicians, demagogists and scoundrels”.
The Spanish writer says that more than 20 years working in countries at war have given him “a life experience” that he now tries to convey in his novels.
“I have no political ideology, what I have is my library. This library is my political ideology,” concludes Arturo Pérez-Reverte.
The publishing house LeYa / ASA considers that “A History of Spain”, translated by Cristina Rodríguez and Artur Guerra, is “a personal and unorthodox account of the checkered history of our neighboring country through the centuries.”
Born in Cartagena, Spain, in 1951, Arturo Pérez-Reverte captured the attention of the publishing market in the late 1980s, with works such as “O Mestre de Esgrima”, “A Tábua de Flandres” and “O Clube Dumas”, which soon they had their adaptation to the cinema.
Creator of Captain Alatriste, hero of the 17th century Spain that Viggo Mortensen played on the screen, Pérez-Reverte is the author of novels such as “El Húsar”, “La piel de drum”, “The queen of the south”, “Good men “,” O Patient Sniper “and” The Bridge of Assassins “.
“Territorio Comanche”, published in 1994, is the result of his experience as a war reporter in the former Yugoslavia, specifically for the newspaper El País.
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