Kate Conley, Edward Tuck Professor of French and Comparative Literature
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In this novel, translated from the Swiss German, a teacher of Latin and Greek meets a Portuguese woman on a bridge in his hometown of Bern, and the chance encounter inspires him to buy a book in Portuguese and take the night train to Lisbon. There he investigates the life and death of the book's author, who lived under the fascist regime that ended with the Portuguese revolution in 1974. Mercier makes 1970s Portugal come alive through the sympathetic eyes of his curious protagonist, whose life is changed by this experience of reading, travel, and investigation.