September 12, 2008

Brazilian Writer: Machado de Assis

This may be especially interesting for Portuguese learners and Brazilian culture appreciators in New York City: from Sept. 15th-19th, there will a centennial celebration of Machado de Assis, a Brazilian author regarded as one of the most important writers of Brazilian literature. This will include the screening of two movies at the Latinbeat 2008 film festival, discussion panels and a book exhibit.

Wheather you are in NYC or not, it may be fun to practice reading in Portuguese by learning a little about Machado de Asiss (if you are not there yet, you can read about him in English here or here).

A lot of Brazilians have read some of his books as part of their high school education, but the language is older and quite different from colloquial Portuguese, so it can be tough to read, even for advanced students. If you are up to it, his original work, in Portuguese, can be downloaded for free from Domínio Público... Or you can get an English translation, just in case :-).

4 comments:

  1. Thanks for the info. My husband and I live in NYC. My husband is studying Portuguese and this will be a cool thing for him. I ran across a new travel site, baraaza.com. I think you might enjoy it.

    Melissa

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  2. I've been learning Portuguese since 2004, I think it is a beautiful language. I have found a website, actually a social network, where I can practice my portuguese while making new friends from all over the world.
    www.babelyou.com

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  3. The Domínio Público site is awesome! A great way to learn Portuguese is to read a story while listening to a native speaker narrate it as you read along, so audiobooks are fantastic. For example, you can download a pdf of the text of a Machado de Assis story and also download an audio version from Audible.com:
    http://tinyurl.com/42mox5

    Enjoy!

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  4. Adoro Machado de Assis! Thanks Ananda. I also recommend this book of contos by Assis:

    http://www.atlanticobooks.com/index.php?option=com_virtuemart&page=shop.product_details&flypage=flypage.tpl&product_id=1148&Itemid=18&vmcchk=1&Itemid=18

    (Missa do Galo e Outros Contos)

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