Sinópse: “Manual of Painting and Calligraphy” was Jose Saramago’s first novel. Written eight years before the critically acclaimed “Baltasar and Blimunda,” it is a story of self-discovery set against the background of the last years of Salazar’s dictatorship. A struggling young artist, commissioned to paint a portrait of an influential industrialist, learns in the process about himself and the world around him. The brilliant juxtaposition of a passionate love story and the crisis of a nation foreshadows all of Saramago’s major works. A must-have for any devotee of the great Portuguese Nobel laureate, “Manual of Painting and Calligraphy” is available in the United States for the first time. Jose Saramago (1922-2010) was the author of many novels, among them “Blindness,” “All the Names,” “Baltasar and Blimunda” and “The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis.” In 1998 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. Giovanni Pontiero translated all of Saramago’s novels until his death in 1997, just after finishing his translation of Blindness. “Manual of Painting and Calligraphy” was Jose Saramago s first novel. Written eight years before the critically acclaimed “Baltasar and Blimunda,” it is a story of self-discovery set against the background of the last years of Salazar s dictatorship. A struggling young artist, commissioned to paint a portrait of an influential industrialist, learns in the process about himself and the world around him. The brilliant juxtaposition of a passionate love story and the crisis of a nation foreshadows all of Saramago s major works. A must-have for any devotee of the great Portuguese Nobel laureate, “Manual of Painting and Calligraphy” is available in the United States for the first time.”