Clássicos Universais: A Odisseia (Portuguese Edition)

The strengthening of fundamental freedoms and democratic principles in the new Constitution as well as the establishment and consolidation of the National Council for Human Rights are positive developments in this regard. However, further progress is necessary, as evidenced by the facts described in the Parliamentary Question. The Universal Service Directive contains the obligation for undertakings providing the call to make caller location available to the authority handling emergency calls.

The same paragraph provides that competent regulatory authorities shall lay down criteria for the accuracy and reliability of the caller location information provided. Consequently, it is for Member States to impose caller location criteria. The Commission attaches much importance to the delivery of accurate location information to emergency services.

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Therefore, the Commission services are currently discussing with Member States in the communications Committee the neccesity of implementing more stringent caller location criteria. Nevertheless, questions have been raised concerning the use of existing European organisations and their cooperation with the European Commission, particularly in making decisions on research strategy and planning in these fields.

How much cooperation is there with the aforementioned European organisations, particularly during the research planning process in their areas of responsibility? Have there been any problems concerning overlaps and shared competence and how were these dealt with? Are these organisations represented institutionally during the preparatory phase for European Commission proposals on matters concerning their fields of research and operation?

Given that funding for these intergovernmental organisations comes mainly from EU Member States, does the Commission intend to propose a different model for enhanced cooperation to avoid expensive overlapping and unnecessary repetition? This cooperation facilitates complementarity and avoidance of overlaps.

It allows the organisations to provide preliminary inputs to Commission proposals and research work programmes in their respective fields of activity. The aforementioned processes coupled with the role of Member States in programme committees and stakeholder consultations underpin, to a large extent, complementarity and synergies. Does the Commission know exactly how these programmes are administered in Greece, i.

Does it believe that the situations described above fall within the jurisdiction of OLAF? The management of the European Structural Funds budget is subject to the rules of shared management. OLAF will examine it and decide if it falls within its mandate for action. If so, how can such a large difference in prices in an alleged single market be justified? Does this price cap comply with EU policies?

Ares Alexandrou

Does the Commission believe that price capping will help to regulate milk prices and the milk market in Cyprus? Are there any measures that the Commission could introduce to help consumers and prevent excessive increases in the price of a basic product such as milk? Pasteurised milk is not included in the list of products for which the Member States have to submit to the Commission a weekly price notification.

Nevertheless, the Commission closely monitors the development of the milk market in EU. The Commission is aware of the existence of price divergences for similar products in different Member States. Setting of maximum prices does not in itself constitute a measure having an effect equivalent to quantitative restrictions provided that there is no in law or in fact discrimination against products from other Member States. The Competition Authorities follow the situation in the milk sector see the recent ECN Report on the activities in the food sector.

The Cypriot competition authority investigates an alleged abusive behaviour in the raw milk sector. A price increase as the one at the origin of the adoption of the Decree may be the consequence of an anticompetitive behaviour by companies and could be assessed under the general competition rules. The Commission stands ready to carefully look into factual and legal issues brought to its attention with respect to any alleged anti-competitive behaviour such as excessive pricing in the food sector.

Aaron Swartz y se hace plenamente cargo del dolor de su familia. La estrategia propuesta indica claramente el compromiso de la UE con un ciberespacio abierto y gratuito. This controversial and brilliant young man was famous for having worked at the age of 14 on very important computer projects still in use today. Beyond his reputation as a programming genius, particularly in the area of Internet applications, this young man became famous for his activism in defence of the free circulation of information online.

The young programmer made a great many contributions to the circulation of information on the Internet. His work was marked by the development of applications that facilitated the production and circulation of information online, including RSS, Reddit, Markdown. His dizzying career as a programmer led him to become involved in cyberactivism as the only way to defend freedom of expression, information and communication on the Internet.

Early on, his career as an activist led him to become aware of the dangers posed to the freedom of information and communication by the new SOPA and PIPA laws adopted in the United States. His activism drove him to carry out actions that would place him at risk, and in the FBI arrested him — but released him without charges — for publishing public court documents for which payment was required on a website.

However, she does not have any particular information regarding the legal proceedings in this case and she has therefore not discussed it with the US. Key concerns are that the process has been rushed, without effective, participatory consultations with a broad cross-section of civil society including IDPs and refugees , and lacks transparency and accountability. What assessment have representatives of the Commission made of the human rights situation in Chin State? How much funding will be provided from the European Union in as part of support for peacebuilding efforts, and what percentage will be earmarked for Chin State?

What are the EU-funded peacebuilding projects to be undertaken in the Chin State? The EU is fully conscious that moving forward in the national reconciliation process must be coupled with endeavours to strengthen the rule of law and the respect of human rights. The EU was again the main sponsor of the United Nations General Assembly resolution on the situation of human rights in Myanmar in The latter include remaining human rights violations, in particular in ethnic areas.

The EU has several ongoing projects funded bilaterally in Chin focusing on child and maternal health. The EU is a major contributor to the multi-donor trust funds education, health and livelihoods. A multi-stakeholder group including the local population and civil society organisations is currently discussing how to conduct a joint assessment to identify priority needs in Chin.

Based on this stakeholder consultation we will be able to determine our response in Chin State, including for peacebuilding. I denne forbindelse er der imidlertid blevet overset et vigtigt aspekt af standardiseringsprocessen i forhold til sikkerheden af bilernes konstruktion. Because of the many electric cables and the high voltage in these cars, it can be very dangerous to cut people out of the car when they are trapped in an accident.

In Denmark, for example, there have been a number of cases in which the rescue team were obliged to let the car burn out, because it was too risky to cut into the car to rescue a person trapped inside. Is the Commission prepared to consider this aspect in its work on the standardisation of electric cars? The Commission is aware of the safety implications involved in the operation of electric vehicles. It has therefore been taking the necessary steps in order to ensure the protection of the occupants of vehicles running with electric power, both during driving and in case of an accident.

In this respect, the Commission has been involved in the definition of technical requirements with respect to the safety of batteries fitted in electric vehicles, in the framework of a working group within the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe UNECE. Hence, regulations are currently in force ensuring the safe behaviour of electric vehicles as a whole and also of batteries as a component.

Furthermore, the adoption of the abovementioned requirements does not preclude Member States from adopting additional measures in order to guarantee an effective operation by emergency services personnel, for instance, through specific training helping to quickly recognise the high voltage parts of the vehicle and the most appropriate measures to be undertaken in any specific situation. In this respect, it should be emphasised that the authorities responsible for emergency services may vary from one Member State to another, and are handled either at local, regional or national level.

Finder Kommissionen, at den danske vejledning er i overensstemmelse med forordning EF nr. The apiary should not be in the vicinity of sources of pollution, which can lead to the contamination of honey or impair the health of the bees — e. In addition, the content of these guidelines is also contrary, for example, to the premises governing other Danish organic food production.

Organic crop production takes place in Denmark side by side with conventional crop production and is thus exposed to external effects, inter alia in the form of spray drift and airborne nitrates. If the Danish guidelines are in line with the regulation, does the Commission consider that the legislative framework for organic beekeeping in Denmark does not treat organic beekeeping in the same way as other forms of organic food production in Denmark, for example as regards the requirements concerning the possible effects of farming methods associated with conventional cultivation?

Can the Commission indicate how other Member States apply this regulation, and if the regulation has the same impact on organic beekeeping in these countries as it does in Denmark? The European organic legislation does not discriminate the organic beekeepers compared to the other organic producers. Based on that, the Danish authorities may restrain the areas where the apiary can be organically certified. Valutazione dell'affidamento condiviso a livello europeo. In base all'articolo 24 della Carta dei diritti fondamentali dell'Unione europea ogni bambino ha diritto di intrattenere regolarmente relazioni personali e contatti diretti con entrambi i genitori.

La definizione di affidamento condiviso appartiene al diritto sostanziale di famiglia e, in quanto tale, non rientra nell'ambito di competenza dell'UE, ma esclusivamente in quello degli Stati membri. Children are the most vulnerable ones in situations of family tension and conflict. In practice, in the event of separation or divorce, this should mean a balanced and continuing relationship for the child with both parents. From the information available on the website of the European Judicial Network, many Member States have made provision for joint custody, which, if rigorously applied, can be extremely beneficial for the children.

However, quite apart from international child abduction, there are very many cases of children born to parents of the same nationality, who, following a separation, no longer have regular contact with one parent. This is a hidden issue that results in thousands of children losing contact not only with one of the two parents, but also with their relatives on that side of the family.

Is there any data at Member State level on the percentages of children in the custody of the father and of the mother, as well as the percentage of children in joint custody? Are there any studies into the effective implementation of joint custody? If so, do these studies show — as the questioner has heard from various sources — major disparities in the implementation of this system for children from different Member States? Are there any studies that identify best practices for safeguarding co-parenting?

Is it aware of any organisations, or networks of organisations, that safeguard parent-child relations in the event of a separation? The definition of joint custody belongs to substantive family law. As such, it does not fall within the EU's competence but remains under the sole responsibility of the Member States. This explains why there may be differences in the national systems as regards the definition of joint custody and how it works in practice.

The Commission is not aware of any studies, best practices or data collected in respect of children in joint custody or co-parenting. The Commission is aware of organisations that safeguard parent-child relations in the event of a separation, such as The International Social Service, as a result of the consultations it conducts concerning its rights-of-the-child policy. Jeg beder derfor om, at Kommissionen vil revurdere behovet for politisk handling set i lyset af de nye oplysninger.

In its answer, the Commission said it would not do anything, but that it was following developments in the area. New knowledge has now appeared which, in my opinion, gives cause for a reassessment of the need for action at EU level. This thorough study shows that coverage is catastrophic. Researchers from Aalborg University have also investigated different mobile phone antennae — including those of popular smartphones. Here too the results have been poor, as the antennae are often unable to capture weaker signals. Regardless of whether it is the telecom companies or the mobile phone manufacturers who should be making an effort, it is the consumer that suffers.

Does the Commission agree that consumers should be better informed through an EU labelling system on antenna strength? If a consumer lives in an area with less good coverage, is there any point in going for a phone with a very good antenna? A labelling system can therefore help consumers make their choice. Will the Commission reconsider introducing requirements for a new minimum standard for mobile antennae in the European market? Will the Commission therefore reassess the need for political action in light of this new information.

Introduction of compulsory labelling for the variety of antennas present within smartphones, corresponding to various bands and functionalities 2G, 3G, 4 G, WiFi , would be complex in its implementation and would not necessarily be understood by consumers. Therefore the Commission does not currently consider it appropriate to introduce additional requirements with regard to such an EU labelling system. Regarding requirements for coverage of mobile networks, they are not harmonised at EU level but depend on the licensing conditions set by Member States for operators.

For example, for mobile services in the MHz band, Denmark has set requirements for coverage of densely populated areas which will ensure a better coverage than required for example of Universal Mobile Telecommunication Services operating in the MHz band. The Commission supports measures reinforcing competitive mobile markets and considers that the imposition of coverage obligations serves the broadband targets set out in its Digital Agenda for Europe strategy in support of increasing economic and social welfare.

It also introduces the capacity — with prior notification to the Gaming Commission introduced in this Law — to implement new gambling games, although these are not specified in the original application. Therefore, the Commission is asked:. It appears from the available information that no project of the nature described by the Honourable Member is currently in the process of being authorised by the Spanish authorities.

In view of the absence of a project or any indication that the Spanish authorities would not correctly apply the relevant EU legislation, should authorisation for any such project be sought, the Commission considers that this case does not warrant, at present, a request of information from the Spanish authorities.

Despite the obligation under Community law to provide the public with guarantees of access to information and given, in particular, the impact that development of a project of this nature will have on many sectors, the lack of information about legal reforms of all kinds carried out by the Autonomous Community of Madrid is quite flagrant. This is a fait accompli policy, totally lacking in transparency and threatening to leave the public in a defenceless situation.

In view of the above:. It appears from the information provided by the Honourable Member that no such project is currently in the process of being authorised by the Spanish authorities. Given this, the Commission is not in the position to request information from the Spanish authorities on this subject. Five of these projects were in just one country — Italy, while Hungary had three projects and Slovakia had none.

What criteria were applied given that Italy was allocated funding for five projects and Slovakia did not receive funding for any projects? Throughout the selection procedures project proposals undergo a double evaluation by independent experts who are selected on the basis of an open call for expression of interest. Taking into consideration the available budget in relation to the number of applications, only the projects having reached the highest score can be retained for funding.

Sostegno dell'innovazione tecnologica automobilistica da parte della Commissione. Le automobili europee presentano uno svantaggio temporale rispetto alle tecnologie informatiche in uso, con un ritardo nella loro applicazione dovuto al ciclo di costruzione di anni rispetto alle evoluzioni della tecnologia informatica che segue un ciclo di circa sei mesi.

Ha la Commissione analizzato se le tecnologie digitali applicate negli Stati membri seguendo le direttive comunitarie, in particolare nel settore della sicurezza dei trasporti, siano in qualche modo inficiate da questo gap tecnologico? Come intende promuovere la Commissione una migliore cooperazione fra settore innovativo e tecnologico e settore automobilistico per rilanciare il mercato automobilistico europeo e renderlo competitivo rispetto alle produzioni extraeuropee? La Commissione ha sostenuto la cooperazione tra i due settori nell'ambito dei programmi di lavoro per la ricerca sulle TIC e del partenariato pubblico-privato nell'iniziativa europea per le auto verdi.

European motor cars suffer from a temporal disadvantage with regard to the information technologies used, with a delay in their application caused by the four-to-five-year construction cycle, compared with the evolution of the information technologies themselves, which follows a cycle of approximately six months.

Has the Commission analysed whether the digital technologies applied in the Member States in accordance with Community directives, particularly in the transport safety sector, are invalidated to some degree by this technology gap? How does the Commission intend to encourage better cooperation between the innovation and technology sector and the automotive industry in order to boost the European automotive market and make it competitive with non-EU production?

The review is expected to comprise a new legislative proposal on how to avoid delays in ITS deployment caused by different development cycles in Information and Communication technologies ICT and automotive industries. It will also touch upon other obstacles, which delay rolling-out of advanced ICT-based safety technologies for road transport and mobility. The Commission has supported cooperation between both sectors under the ICT research work programmes and the European Green Cars Initiative public-private partnership.

The iMobility Forum stakeholder platform will continue facilitating cooperation between the involved parties. The continuation of the Green Cars Initiative with a strong focus on electro-mobility is being proposed by industrial stakeholders under Horizon La Commissione deve sorvegliare gli hedge fund americani nell'UE. La Commissione intende avviare un dialogo con gli Stati Uniti in merito a una regolamentazione, almeno de minimis, su tali fondi? Possono anche essere imposte misure come le restrizioni alla leva finanziaria, qualora esse contribuiscano ad accrescere il rischio sistemico o il rischio di turbolenze sui mercati.

Anche in assenza di passaporto europeo, la direttiva sui GEFIA dispone che i gestori degli hedge fund americani osservino gli obblighi di trasparenza e di segnalazione per commercializzare i loro fondi nei singoli Stati membri. Queste norme consentono di far fronte al rischio di turbolenze sui mercati derivante dalle vendite allo scoperto.

Does the Commission intend to open a dialogue with the United States concerning the regulation, even if minimal, of these funds? Has the Commission examined their impact on the European stock markets, and can it provide documentation for this? The Commission seeks to ensure that supervisory cooperation between EU competent authorities identifies and addresses the exposure of systemically important institutions to hedge funds. Measures, such as restrictions on leverage, may also be imposed if leverage leads to the build-up of systemic risk or risks of disorderly markets.

The Commission will cooperate closely with US authorities in supervising hedge funds that operate in Europe. These measures will allow the Commission and EU competent authorities to better supervise hedge funds in the financial markets and intervene when necessary. These rules address the risk of disorderly markets with regard to short selling. La Commissione riveda i suoi parametri sui pesticidi. Il documento tecnico presentato dalla direzione generale Salute e Consumatori DG Sanco della Commissione Europea porta a una sottostima sistematica dei tassi di pesticidi residui rilevati sugli alimenti, imponendo di dimezzare, in caso di incertezza, il valore minore rilevato.

Di fatto, questo comporterebbe che i residui di pesticidi sarebbero rilevati solo qualora superassero di due volte i valori previsti. La Commissione non ritiene che tale algoritmo crei un rischio serio per la salute dei cittadini? La Commissione desidera rassicurare l'onorevole deputato sul fatto che gli algoritmi usati per interpretare le misure dei residui di pesticidi non presentano un rischio per i consumatori. Pertanto, il superamento di un LMR non porta, nella maggior parte dei casi, ad un rischio per i consumatori. Per tutelare i consumatori, all'atto di calcolare l'esposizione dei consumatori e i rischi tossicologici, i laboratori usano il valore misurato e non il valore che si ricava sottraendo l'incertezza di misura.

La legislazione UE sui controlli ufficiali fa obbligo ai laboratori di controllo nazionali di ottemperare a tale norma. This would mean that the pesticide residues would be identified only if they were double the established values. The thresholds previously in force were already regarded as excessive by the health services, and this further reduction risks compromising the health of European citizens. The Commission would like to reassure the Honourable Member that the algorithms used for interpreting measurements of pesticide residues do not present a risk for consumers.

These algorithms differ depending on the purpose, i. The exceedance of an MRL does not mean that there is a consumer concern. Pesticide MRLs are not set at the highest level of acceptable exposure for humans but at the lowest achievable level consistent with good agricultural practice. Therefore, an MRL exceedance will in most cases not lead to any consumer risk. To protect consumers, when calculating the consumer exposure and the toxicological risks, laboratories use the value as measured and not the value less the measurement uncertainty.

In contrast, when demonstrating MRL non-compliances for enforcement purposes, it is necessary to have a margin of confidence, which is offered by the measurement uncertainty. In practice many laboratories apply a lower factor, depending on their performance. The EU legislation on official controls requires national control laboratories to comply with this standard.

For these reasons, the Commission does currently not intend to review the guidance. El Estado chileno debe tratar de aplicar la justicia con igualdad y no utilizar el Estado de Derecho para mantener ocupaciones de tierras contrarias al Derecho internacional. The Mapuche movements, which have been claiming their ancestral lands for years, are being blamed indirectly.

This Convention is not being implemented by the Chilean Government in the case of the Mapuche community in Chile. The facts presented show a failure to comply with this article. Chile, as a signatory of Convention , is failing to comply with its commitment to international law. The Chilean State must endeavour to apply justice with equality and not use the rule of law to maintain land occupations contrary to international law.

Violence will not help to advance the rights of the Mapuche and other indigenous Chileans, and all sides should engage in peaceful dialogue to build political solutions to long-standing grievances. The Commission understands that efforts are now underway to find political solutions to key issues such as the restitution of ancestral lands, water and other rights. Chile's National Institute for Human Rights is currently investigating alleged human rights abuses and making relevant interventions with the authorities. The EU Delegation is following the situation. Discussions on these matters have also been held with civil society organisations and other relevant bodies such as the National Institute for Human Rights.

In addition to the regular exchanges of views with the Chilean authorities , a number of projects funded by the EC in the field of democracy and human rights. The Malian Government formally requested the intervention of the Economic Community of West African States Ecowas in September to deal with the situation in the northern part of the country, which is controlled by different armed groups. With an unstable political situation, and under the shadow of the feared Islamist jihadism, Western intervention — in this case by France — has not been slow to come.

This means that workers subject to part-time contracts require a proportionally greater contribution period than full-time workers to qualify for a retirement pension. This discrimination between part-time and full-time workers would be legal if it were not for the principle of indirect discrimination, according to which this rule harms Spanish women in particular.

The Court of Justice of the European Union states that this type of indirect discrimination exists where a national measure, albeit formulated in neutral terms, works to the disadvantage of far more women than men. In light of this information, the Court confirmed the existence of indirect discrimination against Spanish women in the labour market, given that it is more difficult for them to complete the minimum period of contribution required to obtain a retirement pension.

Does the Commission believe that this type of discrimination against women may exist in Member States that have a high proportion of women in part-time work? Is it taking any action in this regard? Therefore, Spanish authorities, including Spanish courts and legislator, are under the obligation to implement appropriately the abovementioned judgment. At this moment, the Commission has no reason to believe that the Spanish authorities will not comply with the Court's judgment. Should that be the case, the Commission, as guardian of the treaties, will take the necessary measures to correct the problem.

As to the situation in other Member States in general, the Commission is now looking into this matter and will decide whether or not further action is necessary at this stage. In addition, if the Commission is made aware of specific situations where this type of discrimination against women may exist, the Commission will contact the relevant Member State to address this issue. Mortalidad a causa de las privatizaciones en Europa del Este. The study takes demographic data from 25 countries and studies the correlation between their rates of mortality and the aggressive privatisation policy also known as Shock Therapy.

This economic policy gave rise to an unprecedented increase in unemployment at a time when basic public services were disintegrating, with the loss, for households, of their source of income and means of survival. Is the Commission taking account of the aforementioned study when drawing up its specific recommendations for the Member States?

The Commission takes note of the information provided and questions posed by Honourable Member.

A brief history of postediting and of research on postediting | Ignacio Garcia - www.newyorkethnicfood.com

The Commission takes into consideration the equity aspects of reform and the potential human cost of economic policy, emphasising the need to minimise the reform impact and protect the most vulnerable. Gran parte de este resultado ha sido gracias al desarrollo del Software Libre por parte de numerosos participantes que prefieren compartir las aplicaciones que desarrollan.

Estas respuestas pueden resumirse como sigue:. There has been a boom in software development in recent years that has genuinely opened up access to IT. This wider access to IT has been largely thanks to the creation of free software programs by a large number of software development collaborators who prefer to share their applications with others. The various free software programs are now able to compete on a level playing field with computer applications developed by IT giants such as Microsoft. The Commission has declared itself in favour of free software on a number of occasions, and it has launched various projects, including the OSOR and EUPL projects and many others.

However, in reality, staff at the European institutions find themselves obliged to use the Microsoft operating system, and when it is updated new licences are purchased that must cost millions of euros. Those answers can be summarised as follows:. The Commission follows a rigorous methodology to select the appropriate software configuration in terms of fitness-for-purpose and Total Cost of Ownership TCO , while ensuring sound financial management and complying with the public procurement rules.

The Commission reassesses its office automation strategy periodically, and in close contact with the IT departments of the other EU institutions, including the European Parliament, since virtually all of them are currently using the same framework contracts in this area. Vervallen van het recht op opgebouwd Nederlands wettelijk pensioen.

Verzetten het EU-recht art. Is de Nederlandse wetgeving niet in strijd met het EU-recht resp. De Commissie is van mening dat er een verschil is tussen deze situatie en die in de zaak Piatkowski. Artikel 1 van het eerste Protocol bij het Europees Verdrag tot bescherming van de rechten van de mens en de fundamentele vrijheden waarborgt geen recht op een pensioen als zodanig. Het ouderdomspensioen op deze manier verminderen of niet toekennen impliceert geen regulering van het gebruik van eigendom noch een ontnemen van eigendom, indien er een juist evenwicht wordt gevonden tussen het algemeen belang van de gemeenschap en de verplichting om de grondrechten van het individu te respecteren.

The Netherlands is increasing its statutory retirement AOW — basic state pension age to There are Belgian cross-border workers that have been working in the Netherlands between the ages of 15 and 17 and who have paid their AOW contributions during that time. The statutory retirement age in Belgium is If these workers retire at 65, they will not receive a Dutch AOW pension for two years. The Commission is of the opinion that this situation is different from that in the Piatkowski.

A retirement pension reduced or forfeited in this manner involves neither the control of use of property nor the depriving of a possession if a fair balance is struck between the general interest of the community and the requirement to protect the individual's fundamental rights. A partir de este momento, dicha empresa no puede importar el material producido en sus instalaciones, por considerarse de origen turco al ser plisado y envasado en la Zona Franca Turca.

Teniendo en cuenta que:. In order to be competitive, some European firms send artificial guts made from hardened protein derived from animal products to Turkey for folding and packaging, after which they are returned to Europe. From this point on, the firm is unable to import the material produced at its facilities, as it is deemed to be of Turkish origin, having been folded and packaged in the Turkish free zone.

This situation is prejudicial to and may seriously disrupt the commercial and economic activity of the firms involved. Following consultation of Member States' representatives and stakeholders in relation to the existing trade of collagen casings, the Commission concluded that Commodity code cannot be used for these products. EU requirements for this commodity have not been changed and the Commission does not have the intention to exclude collagen casings from veterinary border controls.

A heated debate has recently been playing out in the Polish media on whether the traffic enforcement camera system currently being set up in Poland is justifiable. Some 29 unmarked road transport inspectorate vehicles equipped with devices to record traffic offences are also circulating on Polish roads.

Additionally, the road transport inspectorate plans to put a system in place to measure average speeds along stretches of road. In this context, it may appear unjustifiable to question the measures described above. This begs the question: The Polish road transport inspectorate does not allow people to see photographs taken by traffic enforcement cameras in cases where the vehicle owner disputes the identity of the offender captured on the photograph. Does this initiative receive EU funding? If so, in view of the glaring lack of motorways and high-speed roads in Poland and the poor state of repair of existing roads, does it make sense to invest such large amounts of money in a traffic enforcement camera system instead of in constructing new or repairing existing roads?

The Member State of the offence may inform the presumed offender of the road safety related traffic offence by information letter whose template is set out in the directive, but it does not prescribe whether the offender should have access to the photograph or not. The directive moreover does not harmonise rules concerning the nature of the offences or the penalty scheme for the offences. The decision to set such rules lies in principle within the competence of the Member States concerned. Therefore, the Commission cannot comment on the details of the new speed enforcement scheme reportedly introduced in Poland as described by the Honourable Members.

The Egyptian Government, which actively encourages the conversion of Christians to Islam, not only denies the same right to Muslims who want to become Christians but punishes them with criminal sanctions in order to force them to comply with Islamic Sharia law. This is increasingly becoming a threat to the Coptic Christian minority and to converts to Christianity. The EU is aware and concerned about the constraints that different religious minorities face in Egypt and condemns all forms of intolerance, discrimination and violence against persons because of their religion or belief, wherever it takes place and regardless of the religion.

Despite EEAS' inquiry in the country, at the moment we cannot confirm whether she is in prison or not. The EU will continue to follow closely the case and monitor the situation on the ground in order to provide additional information. The preliminary design and environmental impact assessment are currently under consideration at the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Environment so that it may issue the environmental impact statement.

Next, the documentation will be forwarded to the Ministry of Industry so that it may grant administrative authorisation. Until the environmental impact statement and administrative approval are available, the documentation will not be made public for complaints to be submitted by organisations and individuals.

Could the Commission intervene to prevent the administrative authorisation from being issued, bearing in mind the repercussions on the aforementioned SCIs and SPA? First and foremost, it is important that these data accurately reflect the significant downturn experienced by some countries, such as Portugal, which has seen a successive decline in GDP, particularly in some less developed regions. Can the Commission therefore state which statistics — on which years — will be used to negotiate and allocate the Structural Funds to the various countries and regions including the outermost regions?

The allocation distribution is based on the most recent available harmonised data, available when the Commission proposal for the multi-annual financial framework was drafted. This data includes regional GDP and population figures for For the other indicators, the reference years are This is the case for GNI data at national level, and for regional data on unemployment, employment rate, early leavers from education and training, and the educational level of the population aged Europe indicators. A FAO, como promotora do processo, tem as suas atividades que incluem diversos projetos e estudos planeadas principalmente para Given that preparations for the International Year of Family Farming must begin well in advance, can the Commission state:.

FAO, as a facilitator of the process, plans its activities including various projects and studies mainly in It is planned that all the necessary data and information will be collated by Commission's services in close collaboration with other EU institutions. O Secretariado-Geral do Conselho lamenta o sucedido. The colours of the flag of Portugal are red, green, yellow, white, blue and black.

At the centre of the flag, against a green and red background, is an armillary sphere over which lies the Portuguese shield, surrounded by seven castles, representing battles in the history of Portugal. We were astonished to note that at the last Eurogroup meeting, the national flag of the Portuguese Republic had been altered, so that in the place of the seven castles were what appeared to be seven pagodas. This does not, however, make it any more acceptable. What was the reason for this adulteration of the Portuguese flag at the Eurogroup meeting?

The flags displayed at the Council's VIP entrance were a gift from a previous Presidency, nearly a decade ago. The regrettable error in the Portuguese flag displayed was not spotted at the time. The whole set of flags has meanwhile been removed and replaced by a new, verified set. Let's just hope that when they overcome those ideological bounds it will not be too late for Europe The book makes a very quick read and captured my interest until the end.

When this novel was first published in French translation, in , it achieved for the author instant although, considering she was born in , rather belated recognition as one of the greatest Russian writers of the century. The story of a few summer months, in , in the live of doutor Pereira, a middle aged journalist responsible for the weekly culture page of the newspaper "Lisboa. A very good reading. After Nature by W. It is an extended prose poem divided into three parts. The second part centers on the German naturalist Georg Wilhem Steller, a member of the Vitus Bering second Kamchatka expedition that landed in Alaska in the summer of The last part is centered on Sebald himself.

The common theme that seems to run through the three parts of the book is that of human suffering, but also of the efforts of people in their quest for meaning, from which an order arises, in places beautiful and comforting, though more cruel, too, than the previous state of ignorance. The Age of Anxiety: Being not the first time, nor indeed the last, that scare tactics and the politics of fear was paramount in American life the Red Scare following the revolution in Russia and the present day tactics of the Bush administration are the two most notorious examples the McCarthy era stuck in the collective memory not only of the United States but worldwide as the most infamous example of the misuse of power in a democratic society.

In an era when a new ''age of anxiety'' has settled in, this stupendous history of those bygone years, written with the verve and insight of Haynes Johnson, provides an understanding of the past that is likely to be vital in interpreting the present. When the ship arrives it happens to have on board a disfigured dead man they claim to have encountered in a dinghy close to the harbor's entry. This, and the almost simultaneous arrival of a luxury boat with a shady crew, arises some doubts in the inspector's mind about the story told by the yacht's crew.

On a different setting, other doubts, of a sentimental kind, are planted in Montalbano's mind by his acquaintance with the young and beautiful Lieutenant Laura Belladonna, from the Harbor Office. Another very fine mystery story of Camilleri's hero, where the dread of old age and the loss of faculties that comes with it is ever so present. In November he left war torn Spain for Paris where he stayed until the fall of France, in , when he left for London, dying shortly afterwards. In this short essay he sharply analysis the reasons behind the French defeat in front of the Nazis' armies.

His thesis is that the French people or at least important sectors thereof did not want to fight to save his country and the democratic regime because they came to believe in the superiority of the enemy's authoritarian regime, and that anything they could do was doomed to failure at the end. In more ways than one, a self fulfilling prophecy! Tauris, London, For a really illuminating account of that loose network of networks generically called Al-Qaeda this is considered by many as the most trustworthy and lucid work.

Written in an engaging prose, this history of the emergence and evolution of present day Islamic radicalism is really unputdownable! All the Shah's Men: This coup tarnished , almost single handedly, the up to then pristine U. At a time when the western powers and the U. In , upon receiving the notice that their son has been killed in action in France, a couple of middle aged working class Germans, with no political activity until then, decide to start their own "war" against the regime that killed their son, by writing every week one or two postcards that they will leave in buildings throughout Berlin, in the hope of raising other fellow Germans to resist the Nazi regime.

They somehow manage to evade police for more than two years but finally run out of luck, are arrested, interrogated and tortured , submitted to the inescapable trial in the People's Court, and finally executed. Written in a terse style, the book manages to convey the atmosphere of deep fear that one lived under Nazi rule, the many small and not so small voluntary collaborations with the authorities, but also the enormous courage of people doing even the smallest acts of resistance or solidarity.

An incredible book that I much enjoyed reading. A very entertaining story by someone who knows its way in the cyberworld: Antonia Huertas is a professor at Universitat Oberta de Catalonia, expert in Logic, e-learning, artificial intelligence, virtual environments and the like, and a dear collaborator that I meet regularly in an academic annual workshop that we jointly organize since The book, as the subtitle states, is a personal description of the trial, including its pre-history, that is, the negotiations between the Allies in the last part of the War that resulted in the decision of constituting the IMT and holding the trials largely an American idea instead of some other methods of dealing with the imprisoned Nazi top leadership such as shooting them without trial, as Churchill defended, or prosecuting them in national courts.

The problems and frictions encountered in drafting the Charter of the IMT, the Indictments, and the selection of the defendants is covered in detail in the first fourth of the book. The remaining deals with the trial itself. What makes this a very interesting book is that it not only describes the public part of the trial but also the backstage, and even some developments that would probably never been known if the author had not been himself personally involved in the works.

Near the end of the trial the author was made Chief U. Prosecutor for the ensuing war crimes trials that took place in Nuremberg for the next three years. It would have be interesting to read his account of those ones. And Our Faces, My Heart, Brief as Photos by John Berger Bloomsbury, London, I found this book, given to me by my good friend Michael Grinfeld , a strange mixture of poetry and essay, a personal digression into time and space, into love, history, art I guess each time I will reread it I will do it from a different perspective, and came back from it with a different impression.

Is it not this what makes a book great? Norton, New York, This is a book about books. In four chapters the author discusses four anti-communist books that were important in shaping the West's perception of Soviet Union's regime at the time of Stalin: All these authors have been Communists, active in the struggle to foster Communist ideas in Europe and the US, but become disillusioned with Soviet's internal and international policies either at the time of the Great Purges, the Spanish Civil War, or the Hitler-Stalin pact.

The tale they tell is by now a very well known: What can be somewhat surprising is the resistance these disclosures got, mainly in France but also in the US during World War II, vigorously promoted by Communist Party members, sympathizers, and fellow travelers. A very interesting and illuminating book. The only philosophy book I have read three times so far and a very enjoyable short digression about justice, truth, and a moral way of living.

Arithmetic by Paul Lockhart The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge MA, This nice little book is another of those enlightning works by Paul Lockhart that are written for the general public but are well deserving a readership as wide as possible. Although, to my taste, his previous book Measurement is far more interesting, this one is also a very well written and precious introduction to central parts of elementary Mathematics: The slow construction and explanation of the algorithms for the four arithmetic operations is particularly interesting. Both this book and Measurement should be attentively read by those thinking to become Elementary School teachers, and also by those already in the profession.

Written with Vonnegut mordant irony, his aversion to violence is clearly present. Some of the stories deserve to be revisited from time to time: They are, indeed, very good. Some although not much of the history and life of the man also comes to light, and one that surprised me was his manias and superstitious character nobody is perfect! The Art of Forgery: What it does not tell us is the sheer beauty of the book: The world of art forgery is indeed a murky world in which several potent interests and motivations which include, but is not limited to, money - lots of it!

This book, that is mostly about forgeries in painting, but also has extended information of cases in sculpture and a more limited although also very interesting set of other type of forgeries such as wines, literary manuscripts, maps, religious relics, and even scientific the infamous Piltdown Man remains , details very many cases in depth and analyzes their history, as well as presenting the forgerers, who are typically technically very gifted artists themselves, in a light that is, if not positive, at least compassionate. At some point he finds out that a prostitute named Magdalene is living in the town of Providencia, and he sets out to find her, so that she may become his disciple and lover.

Together they proceed with their duty to spread the apocalyptic message. A book that, like others by Rivera Letelier, takes place in the harsh conditions of the Atacama desert, in northern Chile, portraying an inhuman landscape where humans can, almost miraculously, cling to life; and doing so with an evocative beautiful language, full of humor, sometimes downright hilarious, as when the "Christ" quotes the following phrase from one of his former disciples: A Arte de Pensar com Clareza: Most of the cases are not exactly surprising, but are unfortunately way too common in both personal and professional lives to deserve a bit of our attention, which this book calls for in an entertaining way.

As Serious As Your Life: Divided into five parts, about diverse aspects of the free jazz scene, it provides a very good panoramic about it in its several dimensions: Some other aspects, maybe surprising at first, like two chapters about the role of women in free jazz, both as supporters and companions of their jazzmen husbands, and as musicians themselves and what they had to battle against the resistance of male jazzmen.

Other chapters, such as one about the politics of recording, are also very enlightening. An appendix with more than biographical vignettes of jazzmen relevant to free jazz is also an extremely useful resource. In the first, the narrator and a friend want to assault a bakery but are persuaded by its Wagner lover communist baker to a deal: In the second story, the narrator has been married for two weeks and he and his wife simultaneously wake up at 2. Telling his wife of the first bakery assault, the narrator is baffled by her reaction, and surprised to find them both driving through late night Tokyo with a shotgun in hand trying to find an open bakery It is a very curious mixture of ancient Egyptian history, detective story, and popular science inquiry.

The author, an Egyptologist and paleopathologist at the University of Long Island, suspects that Tutankhamon was murdered. The possible supporting evidence was obtained from analysis to the x-ray images of the king's mummy. Half of the book is taken by a description of Egypt, particularly during the 18th Dinasty, close to the end of which Tutankhamon reigned. Also included are good short descriptions of the expeditions that led to the discovery of the tomb, and also of some important archaeological discoveries with connection with the author's argument, such as the el-Amarna ruins, and the progressive discovery of the existence and importance of Akhenaton, the father of Tutankhamon.

The book is well translated and it seems that the plot to murder Tutankhamon could indeed have taken place although I was not convinced neither way The author travels through the main currents of macroeconomics, starting with Adam Smith and Ricardo, and continuing to Marx, Keynes, the neoclassical, the structuralists The main assumptions of the models are carefully explained and discussed in a non mathematical way as free from technical jargon as possible.

Although not a book about the current crisis, it does not avoid the issue completely, discussing, when appropriate, several of its causes in the theory and practice of current mainstream economical thought. After reaching the final page, every non economist and, I venture, a lot of economists too have gained a far deeper understanding of the assumptions underlying the public discourse of economists and policy makers, assumptions that often do not seem to be taken by them as such, but as God given truths immune to any rational discussion.

A very good book, deserving repeated visits. It is a very short essay about the failures of last century's artistic avant-gardes, mainly painting avant-gardes, in attaining their objective of creating a new art for a new century. Comparisons with more successful artistic enterprises such as photography and photomontage , cinema, and industrial design Bauhaus' kind of activities are referred to. Given the scope of the subject, one is left with the impression this book should have been a lot longer.

The mission is not easy but Montalbano slowly progresses through the case only to be tricked out of the final arrest, at the very end, by the dead girl's twin sister. Recueillies par Isabelle Chavannes en In ten short experimental lessons performed with simple devices, Marie Curie explains to the children, all of them about ten years old, how do we distinguish air from vacuum, or how the water gets to the tap, or how to measure densities of objects, or how ships float, etc.

Auschwitz Report by Primo Levi and Leonardo De Benedetti Verso, London, This book is the English translation of the italian original Rapporto sull'organizzazione igienico-sanitaria del campo di concentramento per ebrei di Monowitz Auschwitz-Alta Silesia , and was written by the famous italian writer and a fellow inmate of Auschwitz for the Soviet authorities soon after the camp liberations. As the Italian title indicates, it is a report on the hygienic-sanitary conditions in the camp. Gallen University, Switzerland, about the idea of austerity in the last two and a half millenia.

As this book describes, austerity was never a concept distinctly from Economics, but its proponents and defenders were always worried with moral and political aspects much more than mere economic ones sometimes even at the expense of these , but even those arguments concerning the superiority of austerity for morality or freedom's sake turned out, with hindsight, and as many of their opponents argued at the time, to be bogus.

In fact, as the author clearly points out at the end of the book, there are no convincing economic arguments, neither a strong moral or political reason, for abstinence: Sebald Penguin Books, London, A great work by the late German writer Winfried Georg Maximilian Sebald, killed in a tragic car accident in December , in England, where he had been living, writing and teaching since In this long book, with only three paragraphs and a number of beautiful photographs, the narrator tells of his conversations with Jacques Austerlitz over the years, and of Austerlitz struggle to uncover his roots.

Written in a contemplative mood, and progressing through a series of disquisitions about art, architecture, military constructions, town planning, botany This turns out to result in a long journey into traumatic events in recent European history, of which Austerlitz was part as a boy of five, transported from Prague to England in one of the kindertransport in the last days of peace in , already after the invasion of Checoslovakia by the Nazis, as he now rediscovers in his inquires in Belgium, London, Prague, Marienbad, Terezinbad, and Paris.

Not a light reading, but certainly a compulsive one! Along the way the author takes us in a wonderful journey through the present and past of this remote Siberian region, and the people he gets to know some friendly, others not so much , while describing the history of the line and its construction, never too far away from the Gulag slave labor that was the main workforce until the end of Stalinism, but also the enthusiastic young volunteers that came from all over the USSR in the last few stages of the construction.

And also the strolls the author takes in towns and cities along the way, ending up with a visit to Sakhalin. As usual with Rolin's books, references to History, to Literature, and to writers have their natural place along the way and, in this book, a strong presence at the end, with reference to Anton Chekhov's presence in Sakhalin in and its present day reflection on the Island. An enjoyable book about very far away places I would love to visit, and do it by train All encapsulated in a brief week in the life of a recently enriched Parisian bourgeois family between the wars.

In this book, Rolin also crosses the Caspian Sea to Central Asia, visiting several places in Turkmenistan, and travelling across Central Asia's steppes. As usual in Rolin's travel books, we are led not only through the present day place, but also to ramblings about literature, history, politics, culture, and on. I found this book a very nice reading about a mysterious and to me far away exotic city and region that, most likely, I will never visit.

The Origins of the Arab-Israeli Conflict by Jonathan Schneer Random House, New York, As is well known, the Balfour Declaration is a short statement signed by Britain's foreign secretary Alfred Balfour in November and addressed to the head of the British branch of the Rothschilds, in which he pledges the support of the British government to the Zionist goal of establishing a Jewish state in Palestine, or, as Arthur Koestler famously stated, was an instance of one nation promising to another nation the land of a third nation.

The history of the Balfour Declaration is the topic of this book. It turns around four different but interrelated subjects: The main topics, however, are the relations between the Zionists and British officials in London, on one hand, and between the Arabs and the British officers in Cairo, on the other hand. An extraordinarily interesting book about the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict and Britain's role in it before the beginning of the Mandate.

The afterlunch chat between the narrator and his friend: The overwhelming power of the argument that turns a true anarchist into a true anarchist banker, by the foremost 20th Century Portuguese writer. The killing, in , of a hippopotamus that had escaped from the former Pablo Escobar zoo, leads the narrator to remember the story of Ricardo Laverde, a mysterious man he used to play billiards with when he was a young university professor, more than a decade ago, and was killed right next to him by payed assassins on a motorcycle.

After this brutal event, the narrator becomes deeply affected psychologically and starts a quest to know more about the past of Laverde. The result is a panorama of the life of a young idealist couple, the Colombian Laverne and his American Peace Corps wife Elaine, in the 's Colombia. An era of exciting promises, but also the time when the narcotrafficking began to establish its violent hold on society. The events around Laverne's live in the s, but also the narrator's quest in the late 's is actually what constitutes the noise of falling things both the society and the individual , although the poetical title of the book makes its appearance in page 96 of this edition when the narrator completes the earing of a tape record of the cockpit talk in American Airlines flight , a real aviation accident in which the author puts Laverne's wife Elaine.

This book won the Alfaguara prize. What unites both is an utterly devastating rebuttal of the book The Case for Israel by the Harvard Law School professor and preeminent member of the Israel lobby, Alan Dershowitz. The book is divided into two parts and an equally thick set of afterwords Postscript, Appendices, and Epilogue. Finkelstein rebuts Dershowitz's various statements about the "new anti-semitism", about Israel "purity of arms", its use of torture and human rights violations, its treatment of Palestinians including the record of Israel's High Court decisions , as well as Dershowitz's attacks on international, Israeli, an Palestinian human rights organizations.

All this is done resorting to appropriate examples, citations, and sources, it is written with such a precision and and fine attention to detail that, in any society that nurtures true and intellectual honesty, Dershowitz's Israel statements would have been disqualified and forever marked as an unremitting fraud and justly shoveled away. Being things as they are, it was Dershowitz who preassured right and left until he finally got his way and Finkelstein was denied tenure by his University as we learn in this book's Epilogue, written by Frank J.

Menetrez , in what constitutes a very lively illustration of the U. Israel lobby at work and the power it has to stifle speech critical of Israel. As for this Finkelstein book: Discussing issues related to postmodernism and science studies, philosophy of sciences, and religion, this collection should be read by everyone worried about the dire consequences of sloppy reasoning in academia and in everyday life.

A novel with several interwoven stories spanning three centuries and three continents. A tale of love, hate, magic, jazz, and the quest for one's identity. Good intentions can produce more damage than no action at all, that is one of the morals one can infer from this tale: This first well intentioned lie starts up a series of humorous situations in this wonderful novel of manners set in bourgeois Spain of the s and s. A humane portrait of a troubled man in a pitiless era.

The Bolsheviks in Power: The First Year of Soviet Rule in Petrograd by Alexander Rabinowitch Indiana University Press, Bloomington, Written by a respected American historian of the Russian revolution and early soviet period, this book kind of completes a trilogy about the Bolshevik ascension to power that started with the author's study of the failed July coup Prelude to Revolution and continued with his study of the October revolution The Bolsheviks Come To Power. This volume, the first to benefit from the opening of the soviet archives in the s, is devoted to the study of the Petrograd St.

Petersburg Bolsheviks in the first year after October This early period of soviet rule saw truly revolutionary changes in Russia, and in Petrograd in particular, and in this very interesting study we can read about them in a masterful way: All these momentous events are seen from the perspective of a city that lost its capital status to Moscow and whose dire economical and social conditions led to a growing disenchantment of the workers with the Bolshviks, resulting in the formation of independent political bodies, and the increasing depopulation of the city.

The attempts of the Bolshviks to remain in power at the various levels of decision making from factory committees and trade unions to city, local, and national government in face of mounting difficulties and opposition lead very quickly to the dismissal of all democratic mechanisms and to the concomitant increase in the repression apparatus that would be one of the soviet regime staples.

Rabinowitch's new book is an important contribution to our understanding of these turbulent times. A girl with a precise view of what she wants, but utterly egoistical in her dealings with others, which suits her fine, considering the human landscape that surrounds her. A very entertaining reading.

A very interesting book although with a rather shameful proofreading, both on the Portuguese and on the mathematical levels with a lot o interesting and curious informations and anecdotes about the group and its members e. Apart from the unfortunate exaggerations of the late 's and 's, namely the disastrous consequences of the pedagogical experiments of "Modern Mathematics", the original idea and much of the work of Bourbaki had important and everlasting effects in the way mathematics is presented and published.

An interesting book about this episode of the history of last century's mathematical and intellectual lives. Of course, being Portugal a country with a notoriously poor record of scientific achievement, there is not much to say about its science that could be of international interest, since very few of the Portuguese practitioners of science ever got any kind of impact and recognition outside the country's borders suffice is to say that there is only one Portuguese Nobel laureate in scientific disciplines.

In any case, even if, with precious few exceptions, Portuguese scientists have not been at the forefront of their fields, some have made noticeable contributions and a short book like this, aimed at the general public, is a commendable initiative. Apuleius' book, also known also as the Metamorphoses not to be confounded with the namesake work by Ovidius narrates the story of Lucius, who accidentally transforms himself into an ass. The adventures he experiences in that sore condition among all kinds of people, as well as a good number of side stories such as the famous Cupic and Psyche tale are the subject of this very entertaining and, at times, funny book.

Thus one starts in a strange way, with an elderly brother and sister couple start shooting passersby from their apartment This is an engaging book, not least by the portraits of life in a by now, fortunately, long gone Europe: Maybe is the way she slowly builds up tension, or the way the end of a chapters pushes for the beginning of the next one, or her extraordinary capacity to create, or recreate, an overall atmosphere check the first ten chapters, with the action placed in an Ukrainian town prior to World War I, and in particular chapters 6 to 8, whose action takes place in the terrifying experience of a pogrom.

Whatever the reason may be, I finish reading this wonderful book in a single day. It does require a moderate amount of mathematical knowledge although not more than the standard first year undergraduate Analysis courses , but it is written with such a brilliance that one reads it with the eagerness more frequently experienced when reading a good thriller. But then, the history of Mathematical Analysis is, when we look at it in the proper way, one of the most fascinating and thrilling episodes in the intellectual history of mankind. This book is but one of the different stories that can be written: Along the way we visit some of the brilliant ideas of the Bernoulli brothers, Euler, Cauchy, Riemann, Liouville, Weierstrass, Cantor, and Volterra, and we see how, in two and a half centuries, the combined work of these and others outstanding minds shaped one of the most beautiful and powerful of all human creations.

Like in any art gallery, a lot of names, some of then genius, are missing, but what is there is enough to tell a story, to disquiet and to awe the visitor. All in all, this is a magnificent book that all teachers and students of mathematics should read. It is also a work that should sadden us for the beauty herein is not likely to be appreciated by many more.

It comes to mind the following famous poem by Fernando Pessoa, one of the most celebrated of all Portuguese poets in my loose translation: Newton's binomial is as beautiful as the Venus of Milo. The trouble is that few people can be aware of this. And the generalized Newton's binomial expansion is just the beginning: A really delightful and funny reading with helpful annotations by the Portuguese historian Rui Tavares, who also translated the text.

He basically left no written record of his life or work by his own hand and, in spite of the large amount of research that have been accumulating over the years, part of it remains obscure even today. This biography of Caravaggio, engagedly written and beautifully illustrated, is based upon the three early biographies published in the seventeen century complemented and corrected by other contemporary sources and present day scholarship.

It describes Caravaggio's short and tumultuous life and presents the historical context that was the background for his life and work. In the analysis of his paintings illustrated in full color in excellent photos , Graham-Dixon provides the reader with the information needed for a full appreciation of Caravaggio's revolutionary achievements. All in all, this is a marvelous book that I very much enjoyed reading and that I wholeheartedly recommend to everyone, not only to Caravaggio's enthusiasts but to those who are not yet Caravaggio's fans for they are bound to become ones at the end.

A great little novel by the famous spanish writer. His life in the ruined city, among the chaotic atmosphere still prevailing, his interactions with Portuguese notables, as well as and inevitably his love advances, is superbly created by Mega Ferreira in this nice novel. There is, of course, no evidence that the real Casanova has ever been to Portugal.

Another film adaptation The Postman , by Michael Radford, won an Oscar and became a sort of cult movie. To capitalize on its success, the novel started to be published with its current name sometimes with its original title in parenthesis. It is a lovely novel, about the friendship between a young postman and the poet Pablo Neruda, mixing in a beautiful way tales of friendship, love, politics, literature, and the everyday life of a small fishing community.

All interwoven with an exquisite sense of humor. About the passion for books and a bibliophile's loss of reason that leads him to build a house out of his library, literally: A beautiful and at points disturbing story that left me pondering about the ephemeral nature of much of humanity's treasures. The author, a mathematician at University of Lisbon, an outstanding professor students dixit and a dear friend of mine, is arguably the present day best math popularizer in Portugal.

In this book, as in previous ones, Buescu offers a set of short chapters previously published in the monthly magazine Ingenium of the Portuguese engineering association. These seventeen short stories are a wonderful way to get introduced to a number of issues in contemporary mathematics in a relaxed and non technical way: A wonderful little book that one devours in a single gulp.

Its author, Victor Serge, was born in Belgium in , of exiled Russian parents, become an anarchist, went to revolutionary Russia in where he fought for the Bolsheviks, then became a left oppositionist to Stalin, being expelled from the Party, imprisoned and deported to Central Asia, then expelled from the Soviet Union in as a result of an international campaign. Sonnets and Poems of Antero de Quental. Translated by Sylvanus Griswold Morley. Seruya, Teresa and Maria Lin Moniz, eds. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Traduzir em Portugal durante o Estado Novo. Cultural Identity and the Politics of Transmission.

Vale de Gato, Margarida. Translating in the Era of Feminism. University of Ottawa Press, This interconnectedness has already been the subject of important studies focusing on German and Catalan literature; more recently, scholars have shifted their attention to Portugal. Odber de Baubeta argues that without translations, many anthologies would simply never have been compiled; important 20th-century authors and their works would therefore have remained largely unknown in Portugal.

One notable result of the translation anthology has been to promote the canonisation of foreign authors in the Portuguese cultural system. However, this is not a one-way street: Finally, the author argues that current critical thinking on postcolonial translation as well as feminist translation are indispensable not only for an understanding of the dynamics of intercultural transfer, but also for an appreciation of the frequently underrated role of played by translation anthologies in opening up horizons. Keywords Anthologies, canon, juvenile, feminism, postcolonial. Life As Translation Studies becomes more solidly established in Brazil, with a growing number of journals, books, academic congresses, university undergraduate and postgraduate courses, perhaps it is time to reflect on some of the immediate forerunners of the discipline in Brazil.

Auden, William Carlos Williams, J. His translations were awarded a number of prizes: In Paes published Um por todos, which brought together his work up to that date and also in the s he began to write poetry for children. Paes published most of his essays in the s, when Augusto and Haroldo de Campos were still very active, and was seen by some as a counterpoint to the brothers, a translator who worried about meaning as well as form, who took an interest in translating the classical tradition, and who avoided many of the excesses of the brothers.

It was also a time when Translation Studies was just beginning to open up as an academic area in Brazil. It was also the pre- Internet era, and books were difficult to obtain in Brazil and were difficult to import, as Brazilian credit cards were not accepted outside Brazil. As yet, few had a background in translation or Translation Studies. He is the amateur coming into the area from a totally different profession, with an interest in literature, a knowledge of French, Spanish and English, who has learnt to translate by comparing his translations with ones that have already been published, and who has had no teacher other than the dictionary.

One of them is the Historiography of Translation in Brazil. And when translation is mentioned there are a number of somewhat disparaging remarks such as those of Romero: And until way into the twentieth century, translation had a very limited influence on Brazilian literature as just about all the elite, who were both the producers and consumers of literature, knew French and had no need of translations, at least from French.

Paes points to important Brazilian translators and translations: After finishing his course in Medicine, he went to Portugal but was bankrupted by the Civil War of and survived by translating the novels of Chateaubriand, Fennimore Cooper, Walter Scott, Alexandre Dumas, etc. The late nineteenth century saw an increase in the number of translations of novels from France, published in folhetins in newspapers and magazines. Works by these authors have been translated frequently in Brazil, while the work of other major poets such as Tennyson and Browning remains unpublished.

Monteiro Lobato was at the centre of the publishing world in the s and s as a publisher, author and translator and was one of the major forces behind the move to translate more from English. And finally, Paes brings us up-to-date by mentioning recent devel- opments in the field: And the concept of transcreation, which refuses a literal and univocal translation, will provide a definitive answer for those who insist on the untranslatability of literary works. However, the key point on which Paes fails to agree with Haroldo and Augusto is the creation of neologisms.

Paes borrows the term George Steiner uses: Paes also praises the translations of Gottfried Benn by Mario Luiz Frungillo, as the translator did not attempt to offer a parallel form in Portuguese to the German word order. Paes calls such hyperbatons in Portuguese affected or pedantic. But one area Paes does follow Haroldo and Augusto in is the impor- tance he gives to translation. Thus the poet will produce his or her own idiolect within the sociolect, the language of the group. However, the essential difference here is that the translator will attempt to preserve the idiolect of the original poet, but in another sociolect — that of the foreign language — in which he or she will attempt to find an equivalent idiolect to that of the poet in the original language.

Paes returns on various occasions to the translations of Manuel Bandeira. The translator should choose what is essential and may omit or change what is merely there through technical necessity. These superficial elements can be taken out, even though they may be pretty. Furthermore, there will be a considerable contrast between the translator and the artist translator: Moreover, like the poem, the translation of a poem can be interpreted in many different ways. Yet for Paes, moving from one language to another is not an easy job.

Though he could read a number of foreign languages, Paes was not a practical linguist. The Modern Greek he taught himself in order to translate poetry was difficult to use in communication. Though valuing translation and the translator, Paes seems only to value the translator-poet; he shows little interest for those working in the day-to-day grind of translation.

Final considerations The history and historiography of translation in Brazil is a small but growing domain. In order to map the archeology of the area, studies of important commentators, critics and translators are necessary, and I hope this brief study of a key figure that helped to lay the roots of many contemporary studies has made a small contribution to clarifying this architecture. Works Cited Arbex, Paula. Selected Writings of Haroldo de Campos.

Northwestern University Press, Deus e o Diabo no Fausto de Goethe. Pedro II, Monarca Tradutor. University of Massachusetts Press, Milton, John, e Eliane Euzebio. Sob o signo dos signos: Uma biografia de Haroldo de Campos. John Milton and Paul Bandia. Paulo ] i. Linguas, Poetas e Bachareis: It situates Paes as a central figure in the growth of interest in Translation Studies in the s and s and finds in his work many subjects and themes that would later be developed by subsequent scholars in the area.

Translation and Literature again: Recent approaches to an old issue T he debates over the status of translation throughout the history of Western culture point to an ambiguous status — between sub- alternity and artistic merit — and also to a constant but discreet presence of translations in the history of western literatures and cultures. This somewhat paradoxical image is probably intrinsic to cultures of European origin, as Henri Meschonic 32 recalls. The profound changes that occurred after World War II promoted a generalized awareness of the role of translation in the contemporary world.

The surge of Translation Studies in the second half of the twentieth century and its epistemological and institutional recognition as a research area and an academic discipline emphasized the importance of translations and translators in the development of cultures and in economic and political relations, originating a proliferation of centers for training translators and for research on translation. In Portugal, the acknowledgement of the role of translation, almost inexistent until , started in the s, when Portugal joined the European Community.

Although academic interest in translation issues already existed for quite some time in the Faculties of Arts and other education institutions involved in language studies,2 it is mainly since the s that Translation Studies has spread and begun to strengthen its position as a research area in Portuguese higher education institutions. Despite the fact that training and research activities in translation nowadays cover the most varied areas — from scientific and technical translation to audiovisual translation, including interpreting and editorial activity — in this paper we will deal mainly with some of the changes linked to research in Literary Studies or originating from them.

In this essay, I intend to address concisely some of the aspects of the evolution in perspective introduced by Translation Studies in the research on literature and culture in Portugal, based on a few factual examples of works that point to innovative trends and ways of approaching literature, and also of studying the role of translation in society and in cultural 2 Research in translation has existed in the Faculties of Arts since the s or even before that, namely in the Germanic or Romanic study areas, linked to literature or linguistics subjects cf.

I consider these cases merely as representatives of many other research works and as the starting point for a reflection on some of the views that seem to be involved in Translation Studies in Portugal , especially when we consider translation and literature. I will consider three current trends in Translation Studies that seem to have been adopted by translation researchers in Portugal over the past decades: Among the works published in Portugal, I shall begin with some examples of historiographical or sociological studies developed from polysystem theory and Descriptive Translation Studies.

These works are devoted to the study of translations and translators and their status within the Portuguese society, aiming at analyzing the norms governing cultural exchanges and the work of translators. The example presented here — a research project on the role of translation in the history of Portuguese literature — addresses a great variety of case studies comprising several periods of the history of Portugal, from the Middle Ages to contemporary times. Finally, I shall discuss some of the issues of literary and philosophical approaches.

We propose therefore that we call […] knowledgescape […] the migration of ideas, concepts and methods across disciplinary bounds that inceasingly characterize the field where research in the humanities is staked out today. In this light, Translation Studies could very well be seen as a product of the contemporary knowledgescape, not a discipline, not even an interdiscipline, but rather a principle of flux, of unceasing intersections and realignments, an interfacing domain where thought becomes nomadic, where a multiplicity of language-games can coexist, clash, intermingle and cross- fertilize: Representations of the Other in Portuguese Culture a project developed in Portugal between and Seruya et al.

They outline some of the traits that help define the dominant translation norms of each period, the position of translated literature in the history of Portuguese literature, and the dominant viewpoints in Translation Studies in Portugal. This research project, the first or at least one of the first to study a broad corpus of texts from different periods and to identify historical trends and characteristics of the norms of reception of foreign literatures in Portugal, is also fundamental in the sense that it opens up new ways for historiographical research on translations.

Furthermore, it opens up perspectives that contribute to a different way of looking at the history of national literature and at its relations with foreign literatures. In the concluding chapter, the authors argue the need to introduce the study of literary translations into the teaching of Portuguese literature and history of literature Seruya et al. They also acknowledge that both the author and the source text are still the primary reference in many approaches to translated texts.

Furthermore, they state there is still insufficient knowledge about the modes of literary transfer. They conclude that there is a need to synthesize and to think globally about the scattered works that still exist; they also propose the production of more ambitious works on a large scale, such as the publi- cation of a dictionary of translators, a general history and a sociology of translation in Portugal, so as to promote the understanding of the functions of translated literature throughout history.

From this global, systemic and historiographical perspective, the authors seem to refute an individual poetics of translation: We should move away from predominantly researching translators who were acknowledged authors at a given time. If we persist with this approach we are reaffirming the paradigm of authorship against other cultural phenomena such as translations and rewritings in general.

Thus, should we preserve the myth of authority, we will be perpetuating the silence that surrounds translators and barely contributing with anything new to what we already know about any given time. However, it does not seem to me that we are dealing with absolute and mutually exclusive alternatives in this area.

The need to study translation from the viewpoint of the target system has become increasingly visible not only in publications of individual case studies, but also in broader studies of repertoires. Translations from specific periods of Portuguese history have also been studied, e. There were also many studies — post-graduation disserta- tions, articles from journals and papers presented at conferences — on translation by individual authors, on translators and texts from different periods, on specific kinds of texts, from different perspectives historical, sociocultural, linguistic, philosophical, political.

To a lesser extent, we find 5 Cf. There are very relevant contributions on the characterization and understanding of the norms that preside over both modes of translation and the criteria underlying the publication and production of literary texts, whether translated or not, in the Portuguese cultural system and in its relationship with the dominant cultural systems. In other words, it is essential to articulate them with other stages of analysis, no matter how broad as they might be, capable of overcoming the limitations from a strictly individual, partial and national view.

Holmes at the beginning of the s: Holmes in […]. The goal is to understand how the power of norms is integrated and acted upon, how translators whether literary or not conform to what is expected of them or, in other words, how they use self-censorship to respond to those expectations, until they become effective craftsmen, punctual, invisible, flexible. How do they accept that symbolic violence Venuti ? And what do they obtain in return? Gambier 39 9 The broadening of the study of translated literature to the macro-structural constraints of its production and reception, and to the understanding of the process, socio-economic and political conditions, motivations, criteria and relationship with cultural norms taken upon by the human agents of that process — namely the translators — determines a change of perspective, a change that is less concerned about a strictly textual and aesthetic reading of the translated works than with their usage and action on the social level.

This situation entails in some way a decentralization of the place of translated or untranslated literature in the cultural system, since nowadays it competes with many other cultural products. The trend is to take over the translation of literature as an element of a wider system that comprises all translation and re-writing types practiced and consumed in a certain society, and the connections they establish among themselves and with the remaining systems, not only in the social sphere but also in relationships with other cultures.

This paper attempts to present a provisional collection of data in order to contribute to the assessment of the current importance of translation as intercultural activity in Portugal. We, therefore, aim to appraise the degree of interference of other cultures in the contemporary linguistic and cultural input of the Portuguese repertoire. As a consequence, they allow for alternative readings of the national canon in Literary Studies. Some of the issues raised and developed in the book: The notion of translation will serve mostly to address human and social processes of mobility and displacement, no longer being confined to textual processes.

Potentially, every situation in which one tries to find meaning from a relationship with difference, may be described as a transferred situation. In this broad meaning, the concept of translation points towards the way in which not only different languages, but also different cultures and social and political contexts and practices may be linked, so that they become mutually intelligible, without sacrificing difference for the sake of an assimilation principle.

In other words, the question of translation ethics and the politics of translation became much more pressing nowadays. There is culture where there is interaction and relationship with what is different, what Bakhtin calls the participative autonomy of all cultural facts, that is, the concepts of a dynamic, not static culture, which is heterogeneous and not homogeneous.

On the other hand, to think about the internal heterogeneity of cultures means, naturally, to understand translation not simply in relation with intercultural interactions, but with connections established on the intracultural domain. It has created some polemics in Translation Studies. Criticisms are fundamentally directed towards an abusive usage of the concept of translation implicit in the notion of cultural translation, frequently used in Cultural Studies and Postcolonial Studies, specifically after the publication of The Location of Culture by Homi Bhabha.

They underline the lack of knowledge of the contributions that Translation Studies has been making for several decades to the reflection on translation and culture. The first problem appears when we refuse definition, a shared absence as mentioned before. Even in the cultural background that nowadays dominates Translation Studies, to translate always involves the relationship between a source culture and a target culture mediated by actions of language manipulation. This can be productive and stimulating for both fields involved.

On the other hand, the generalized productions of metaphors may risk expanding the term translation until it becomes meaningless Duarte or indeed of losing track of the original referent. Michaela Wolf points out the risk of developing a sociology of translation without translation Wolf Pym, Exploring Michaela Wolf also develops several of these points when she examines the contributions of Postcolonial Studies to a change of perspec- tives in Translation Studies. Sousa Ribeiro outlines the questions these theories raise about the concept of originality and the priority of the original, about the vision of translation as a way of negotiating differences and of making differences evident, about translation as a phenomenon that is not merely intercultural but also intracultural, and about translation as a condition of the self-reflexivity of cultures Ribeiro Other approaches can be developed, however, and were actually the first to be adopted in Portugal.

This is the case of the poetics of translation, to which we now turn. In Literary Studies, these case studies frequently deal with texts from the literary canon translated by writers, poets or professional translators whose work is acknowledged in the literary target system. Many of the case studies published in Portugal, namely in the scope of Comparative Studies, still analyze literary translation from this perspective.

However, they broaden the analysis by integrating the critical contributions of Translation Studies, Cultural and Postcolonial Studies, deconstruction or discourse analysis, aiming at a more rigorous knowledge of the literary text, at the analysis of the enunciatory process of literary translation, and at the definition of the poetics of translators.

From the very beginning of his book, Barrento proposes to present thoughts on translation from three viewpoints: Some questions stand out from this book. Although based on an individual experience in an area that claims to be specific — literary translation, and essentially the translation of poetry — the issues tackled in these essays are common to other research on literary translations and in Translation Studies in general.

These translators can address several questions regarding their condition or position as authors and mediators in the target system, determinant of the status of the texts translated in this system. Some of the most enriching and stimulating reflections on literary reading and translation are by writers and poets. In conclusion, we may say that several paths have been opened up and developed by Translation Studies in Portugal in the last decades. More recently, contemporary reflection in Translation Studies has introduced the historical, sociological, deconstructionist and postcolonial approaches.

The quantity and diversity of projects, essays and case studies developed in Portugal in the past 20 years, but also many other kinds of translation — from audiovisual to scientific and technical translation, and more recently interpreting — have considerably broadened the scope of the Translation Studies. On the other hand, they show the privileged potential of literary texts to raise pertinent questions for a more in-depth understanding of the role of translation in the cultural and political practices entailed in interactions between cultures.

It is thus foreseeable that, in the open atmosphere of critical self-reflexivity displayed by Translation Studies today, literature will continue to stimulate debate. Translation, History and Culture. The Location of Culture. Translation Studies at the Interface of Disciplines. Doubts and Directions in Translation Studies. Sociocultural Aspects of Translating and Interpreting. Beyond Descriptive Translation Studies.

Translation Studies and Literary Theory. Translation and Censorship in Different Times and Landscapes. Cambridge Scholars Press, Descriptive Translation Studies and Beyond. Translation — Reflections, Refractions, Transformations. Paul St-Pierre and Prafulla C. Beyond the Boundaries of Translation Spectrum. Three main current trends in Translation Studies are analyzed, based on major Portuguese works published during this period of time: As far as literature is concerned, the evolution of Translation Studies in the last decades shows both a weakening of the traditional centrality of literary translation in the process of reflecting about translation and on the translating activity itself, and in cultural activities in general; simultaneously, it stresses the privileged potential of literary texts in the understanding of the role of translation in the cultural and political practices entailed in intercultural relations.

Under the Sign of Janus: Reflections on Authorship as Liminality in Translated Literature 1. Avant Propos Translation is irreducible: Theo Hermans Paratexts have always played an important role in the history of literary translation. Much attention has been devoted to what translators — often renowned translators, i. Following this tradition, readers of translation history tend to focus exclu- sively on prefaces or preface-like material.

Regardless of what the translator actually did, prefaces and preface-like material are constrained by the accepted discursive practices applicable to the format: However, a measure of defensiveness seems to be akin to preface-like texts. Footnotes are, I would like to suggest, the clearest manifestation of the Janus-like presence of the translator in the text: Paratextual sites are, as Genette so aptly put it, a threshold, a zone between text and off-text, a zone not only of transition but also of transaction: Margins are not exempt from power relations, and liminality usually goes unscrutinized as long as it does not call attention to itself.

Footnotes tend to do exactly that. Certainly, paratexts in translation offer information and supplement the loss of meaning in puns and wordplay, but often also question authority discreetly or openly, evincing all the while one other presence, one other voice. Margins below and after the text appear to be inconspicuous or are, at least, functions of paratexts in so-called original texts. However, much of what he says finds echo in translatory paratexts, and his work is, therefore, of import for the present reflection.

Most editors prefer translators to make use of the space in the margins of or after, rather than before the text. Geography is never guileless. While the interruption may be an irritant, it nevertheless warrants precision as it purportedly seeks to pay homage to the absolute singularity of the text. However, it is precisely the expectation of exactitude that makes room for a measure of authority of the margins. Textual geography is indeed destiny for translators. Regardless of what the translator may think or even purport. Ghosts of an Absolute Past [A] book, like any work of art, is a series of illusions, and however convinced you are by them, however much you see yourself in the characters and their dilemmas, there is another character behind all the others.

This is the concealed author who is everywhere and nowhere, the dreamer himself, the trickster who played the trick, with whom you also identify. Hanif Kureish The infatuation of Western culture with the trickster is both unquestion- able and the source of multiple readings and misreadings. Whether one likes it or not, the assumption of authoredness pervades every 7 The orthodoxy alluded to above is mainly that of the common reader, as well as that of publishers and reviewers.

Even if postmodern and postcolonial discourses have engendered a change in expectations regarding paratextuality, the reading protocols of the Western culture still tend to look at footnotes in translated texts as a locus of loss. He does not, however, address it as a stage for struggling over power and authority. The author — the physical author — lingers on in the imagination, offering and precluding interpretation s. Of course, this author is as much a figment as every narratological category created to circumvent the difficulty of dealing with authors who have bodies.

Being a persona more than a person does not, however, prevent the author from being meaningful, i. This is all the more obvious when one reads translations. A translation is a text that circulates in a given culture as a mediation of another text, another author, another culture. The wound of difference lies at its heart. Translators write on behalf of authors, write as authors would have written had they been native speakers of the target culture, so the illusion goes.

Readers read translations as if they are reading foreign authors: The illusion is all the more necessary because it counteracts the fear that translation may actually equal counterfeit: Suspension of disbelief, then, plays an important cultural role when discussing translation because it assuages the fear of inauthenticity, while creating at the same time a space for sacredness.

In a significant non- -metaphorical way, translation is an act of the imagination: And, of course, translation is always a misreading of sorts. The foreign text, then, is not so much communicated as inscribed with domestic intelligibilities and interests. Transforming a text into a translation is an act of faith: Choosing to privilege coincidence and transparency between lan- guages and texts over difference has a threefold manifestation in Western culture. First, translators are expected to act as unpolluted channels9 — prophets in the service of a foreign god.

This conception certainly entails a measure of implicit trust, however, it also robs translators of any trace of singularity: Therefore, they are nothing but artisans, forever repeating the original creative gesture. Ideally, translators would be nothing but ghosts: Second, singularity is — culturally, ideologically — ascribed not to creativity but exclusively to that perceived as original, giving voice to a nostalgia by replacing a site left void: As a result, translation is mentioned only when the task is perceived to be wanting.

No wonder, then, that translation is commonly viewed with suspicion, as well as distrust. For an updated view on how translators view these expectations, see Wilson, Grossman and Bellos. Is this postulate incised in human mentality? Is it possible for us, at the level of intuitive immediacy, to imagine, to apprehend substantive meaning, existence without origination? Grammars 14 It would seem not.

Walking the tightrope of illusion, translators — as Anthea Bell paradigmatically shows in a predictable text that reproduces most of the commonplaces on translation — may wish to be invisible but rarely are: And that of their language and culture and time. Paratexts, it seems, become the proper geography for the chiaroscuro of experience. Authorship in Translation as Liminality Each voice is alone and unique, and it is against the heart of others that it, vertiginously, reverberates. This voice creates a privileged relationship with the readers of translation, part mediational, part straightforward.

Schiavi 3 However, expressions of authorship inside the text are seldom evident for two main reasons: More intriguing is, therefore, the set of authored assertions known as notes, be they footnotes, endnotes usually in the form of a glossary or opening notes. These notes are conventionally acknowledged to be the territory of the translator; they even usually carry some form of signature in Portuguese editorial tradition: Maria Tymockzo summarizes the taken-for-grantedness of such paratextual material in translation: In the form of introductions, footnotes, critical essays, glossaries, maps, and the like, the translator can embed the translated text in a shell that explains necessary cultural and literary background for the receiving audience and that acts as a running commentary on the translated work.

In instances when it is impossible to maintain the illusion, the translator is offered a perfect geography to admit failure, and proclaim their indebtedness to the author ity: In order to showcase the multiple uses of paratextual material in translated narrative, I will now discuss four different paratexts in translated fiction: As the list hopefully shows, my purpose is to assemble a sample of different texts written at different times and places by different authors, presenting different difficulties.

In a longer study, it would be relevant to consider each work and its place in the literary system of both the source and the target cultures. This will not be attempted here, as the goal is rather to display and discuss the emergence of authority in translated texts. Important is the fact that all four translations were published in the last decade, since, in recent times, I have been struck, as a reader of translations, by the sometimes overflowing presence of paratextual material, most notably footnotes. I have divided the four texts into three categories: The Translator as Encyclopedia I want translations with copious footnotes, footnotes reaching up like skyscrapers to the top of this or that page so as to leave only the gleam of one textual line between commentary and eternity.

Vladimir Nabokov This category includes two very distinct texts and renderings: Besides being narrative texts, these two novels have little in common. Moreover, O Mapa dos Ossos and Jane Eyre have had to contend with different audience segments and, consequently, different readership expectations. From what I can surmise from the scraps of data available, the two translators come from different backgrounds. Nothing would seem to justify looking at them together. However, when one looks into the way they choose to represent themselves in the paratexts of O Mapa dos Ossos and Jane Eyre, one notices that Rui Viana Pereira and Alice Rocha have a shared trait as authors of footnotes: The Irreverent Translator James Rollins is a best-selling author who writes thrillers and adventure books, often set against a historical background.

Such is the case of The Map of Bones The book opens up with a paratext vouching for the accuracy of the data: The precision of any fiction is a reflection of the facts presented. As such, fiction must always have a foundation of truth. To that end, all the artwork, relics, catacombs, and treasures described in this story are accurate. The science at the heart of the novel is based on current research and discoveries.

It could be argued that the average reader who buys and reads The Map of Bones may not be primarily concerned with the truth of the events narrated or objects described. Not so the translator. O Mapa dos Ossos presents twenty-six footnotes, and most of them are sites of a new and unmistakable authority. Even though the term brings forth many other references in the European reader, which contradict the narrative intention of the author, we have decided to keep the original expression.

To further complicate matters, the novel had already been translated 13 All crib translations of the different Portuguese rewritings are my own. For the purposes of the present reflection on authorship, however, the most relevant aspect of this new translation is its footnotes. Much of the information included in the footnotes pertains to the identification and clarification of quotations and references. The translator sees it as her mission to decode many of the instances though not all of an intertextual nature, and duly informs the reader about poets, novelists, kings and queens Thackeray, Fielding, Boadicea , locates quotations, decodes names Thornfield, Rosemond , explains customs, and translates expressions in Latin and French.

All is rather excessive and threatens to weigh down the novel. There is no reference whatsoever to the original publication on the reprint. Como tal, uma leitura muito apropriada a Helen Burns. Rasselas, the protagonist, is a prince of Abyssinia who, tired of a life of comfort and luxury, sets out on a voyage around the world with the purpose of finding out how other people live. During his travels, the prince concludes that happiness is unattainable in this world and that human beings should focus their attention on eternal life. As we can see, a very appropriate reading for Helen Burns. Many more examples could be adduced.