I am a writer who has written about the life of my people, the character of my people. What I can say is that the greatest hero of the Brazilian novel is the Brazilian people.

Porque – eu vos digo – temos olhos de ver e olhos de não ver, depende do estado do coração de cada um.

Friends, we have a hero living among us.

Not even God who made us all can kill everybody at once. He kills people one by one, and the more he kills the more people are gonna be born and grow up and go...

Life was good, one had only to live it.

He owned a whole world full of memories, of lovely moments relived and happy recollections. I’m not saying he was happy or that he didn’t suffer. He suffered very much, but he did not despair;...

I’m under no illusions about the importance of my work. But if it has any worth, it is that it truly reflects the Brazilian people.

The best translations are always the ones in the language the author can’t read.

Night was running ahead of itself.

I am like my characters – sometimes even the female ones.

Many things I might not write today because I no longer believe them, but I wouldn’t change them, since I believed them at the time.