BOOK ONE
I, MWANITO, THE TUNER OF SILENCES
I was eleven years old when I saw a woman for the first time, and I was seized by such sudden surprise that I burst into tears. I lived in a wasteland inhabited only by five men. My father had given the place a name. It was called, quite simply, Jezoosalem. It was the land where Jesus would uncrucify himself. And that was the end of the matter, full stop.
My old man, Silvestre Vitalício, explained to us that the world had come to an end and we were the only survivors. Beyond the horizon lay territory devoid of any life, that he referred to vaguely as “Over There.” The entire planet could be summed up in a nutshell like this: stripped of people, with neither roads nor traces of any living creature. In those faraway places, even tormented souls had become extinct.
–Mia Couto
to read more, and a preface by translator David Brookshaw, visit Warscapes.com
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