pereira maintains (w. antonio tabucchi, tr. patrick creagh)

This is an affectionate portrait of a fat man who finds himself compelled against his wiser instincts to do the right thing. Set in Lisbon during the time of the Spanish Civil War, when Portugal was about to enter into its own dictatorship, the story narrates how Pereira, the protagonist, finds himself caught up with two sympathisers of the Republican cause and proceeds to help them even though they are feckless and he realises this will probably lead to his own demise. As well as being a tale of unassuming heroism, it is also a lovely portrait of 1930s Lisbon. It’s a slight book, but it has a sting in the tail and Tabucchi manages his narrative with a disarming charm. If, as is so often noted, for evil to triumph all it requires is that good men do nothing, here we see a man who has little pretension to being in any way political showing us that it is possible to act, and that there’s often a case for following your instincts even if they appear not to be in your interests.