
Pereira Declares takes place in Lisbon, Portugal during the 1930s; a time when fascism was strong in Europe.  It was a period in history when nationalism overtook personal freedom and there was pressure against individual, liberal thinkers.  Censorship was used by the government to control public opinion.  It probably was a difficult time to be a writer for a newspaper.

 Pereira is a reporter for the Lisboa, a small time local newspaper in Lisbon.  His job was to write articles for the culture page of the newspaper.  This position is important for Tabucchi to create because it seems that Pereira is in a difficult area for writers  who live in a fascist environment.  How does one deal with cultural issues when the authorities are mandating behavior in a fascist regime?  This creates conflict for Pereira who must deal with this pressure every day since he has to write an article on cultural issues every day for the newspaper.

Pereira has many other personal issues to deal with that hang over him like a dark cloud and create additional stress and pressure in his life.  He is an overweight and lonely man.  His wife died after struggling with health during their relationship.  They never had a child, which he always wanted and he is consumed with the concept of death.  Pereira clearly is in a state of depression.

Tabucchi focuses on the heat constantly in this novel and the inability for Pereira to escape it.  The fans do not work well, Pereira needs to sit inside in restaurants to try to avoid the heat and he constantly drinks lemonade to satisfy his thirst.  It’s almost like Tabucchi is using the weather to emphasize the pressure that Pereira feels in his daily life.  He cannot escape it.

Pereira reads a magazine article by Montiero Rossi, a young writer, and it attracts his attention so much that he asks to meet Rossi.  Rossi is a bit of a character.  He is young, good looking and has a beautiful girlfriend.  They meet at a festival that is anti-government.  It’s possible that Pereira sees a bit of himself as a young man in Rossi.  Or maybe it is what Pereira thought he might have been when he was young.  He compares his fitness and hair of his youth to Rossi several times.  After the meeting, Pereira decides to hires Rossi to write for the Lisboa.  When Rossi delivers his first article, Pereira notices Rossi’s anti-fascist approach in his writing.  Pereira tries to explain that he must not write articles in such a way, because it will get the attention of the authorities.  However, Rossi is finding it hard to write with his “head” when his “heart” is pushing himself to express his anti-fascist views.  Know that you know what Pereira Declares is through chapter 6, what elements make-up Pereira Declares?  What’s the larger picture?

Many stories have word choices that have unique criteria as well as a larger picture behind it; that doesn’t change with Pereira Declares.  The book’s go-to-word “declares” was used forty total times throughout chapters three through six.  Many of the sentences beginning or ending with “Pereira declares” usually lead to a phrase that will explain or state details of importance about a situation or fact.  Although the phrase is rarely necessary for Tabucchi to tell Pereira’s story, the phrase constantly is used almost to force the reader to accept that this is how Pereira views the story and since he “declares” these things, they must be true.  A cluster of words that has appeared multiple times are “death”, “life”, “soul” and “catholic”.  There is much more meaning behind these words.  These tell us about the beliefs of Pereira and Rossi and what might impact their thoughts and behavior.  “Pereira was a Catholic, or at least at the moment he felt himself a Catholic, a good Roman Catholic, though was one thing he could not bring himself to believe in, and that was the resurrection of the body.  Of the soul yes, of course, for he was certain he had a soul” (2/1-5).  Pereira, as a Catholic, believes in the soul and that the soul will be resurrected after death.  This is emphasized several times in the story and is used to emphasize that Pereira is far more interested in his soul being resurrected after death than his body.  As for Rossi views death in a less philosophical way even though he is a philosopher.  “Then, more quietly: Listen, Dr. Pereira, I’ve had quite enough of death, two years ago my mother did…and last year my father died…and I’m fed up with death” (12-13/34, 1-8).  He has been surrounded by a lot of death, and all he wants to focus on is life, so when he was asked by Pereira what he thought about dead, he didn’t have much good to say about it.

Words often have multiple meanings, particularly when used by a story teller like Tabucchi.  Metaphors, symbolism, figure of speech occur in practically all books.  Pereira doesn’t use very colorful or complex language, but there are a few words in his speech and thoughts that are critical to the story.  The most important and frequent word is death.  Pereira talks constantly about the death of his wife and how it started his depression.  Then he discusses the death of the carter, who was gunned down by the police, and this continued to make him feel bad and depressed.  He felt the world was “dead”.  Of course the world isn’t dead, but it does raise the question why he thought this.  Living in fascist state isn’t easy.  Having to live with unfair laws, having common rights violated and people dying senselessly caused Pereira to go into a state of depressive sadness and hopelessness that things will never get better.  “Dead doesn’t mean death, in this case it means hopeless.  Another example, but with less importance is, “And he danced that waltz almost in rapture, as if his paunch and all his fat had vanished by magic” (16/30-31).  This is good example of a metaphor.  He was filled with energy, and usually when doing an activity, he is winded, but his time it was like his fat was gone.  Obviously his fat did not disappear and magic wasn’t real, but almost like “magic” he was able to dance without losing energy.  Another literary technique used in Pereira Declares is imagery.  Pereira, who is a writer, naturally uses details to his advantage, “The girl who turned up had an Italian straw hat on.  She was really beautiful, Pereira declares, her complexion fresh, her eyes green, her arms shapely.  She was wearing a dress with straps crossing at the back that showed off her softly moulded shoulders” (15/1-4).  He uses superb details to better help us picture the stunning beauty of Marta.  He also creates similar imagery when describing the various scenery of Lisbon, the setting created by the musicians or the muggy and oppressive heat.  

 The most interesting thing I noticed was the backwards writing, “Oh why have I no children” (17/4).  In today’s writing we would say something more on the lines of, “Oh, why don’t I have children”.  Instead, Tabucchi uses a combination of modern English and Shakespeare.  This has to do with the time period.  This story takes place in the 1930s during a time of suffering and challenges for people living in Portugal.  Being able to determine when this book was written helps us understand what was going on at the time and gives us a better perspective of the character’s mindset.  The mindset of the character may also be established by the use of syntax in sentences.  Sentence syntax, such as the inverted sentences, also might be used to deliver messages for the reader more than what the character is actually saying.  The author might write the text in a certain way to tell other things.

It is important to not only read the story but also to read how this language is used to tell the story.   Closely reading the texts helps to identify hidden facts otherwise could be missed.  Identifying key words, focusing on imagery and recognizing the figure of speech will help you out a lot in understanding the story behind the story.  The first few times that I read the word “dead” in the story I picked it up, but incorrectly.  I believed Pereira was depressed when he mentioned the world was “dead”, but know after looking closer into it I realized it wasn’t only about him, it was about the world having no hope of recovery.  Reviewing the writing again and looking back at certain of the specific words used by Tabucchi helped me identify the relationship and conflicts between Pereira and Rossi because both have opposite beliefs yet are working together. As an average reader I would have miss understood the first six chapters without breaking down what I had read.
