The Crossing: A Story Of East Timor
Publishing Details
The Crossing: A Story Of East Timor
By (Author) Lus Cardoso
Translated by Margaret Jull Costa
Granta Books
Granta Books
10th January 2002
United Kingdom
Classifications
General
Non Fiction
Asian history
959.8603092
Physical Properties
160
Width 131mm, Height 198mm, Spine 11mm
140g
Description
Between the silence and the headlines is the story of a people struggling to form an identity under different forms of colonialism. This memoir describes Luis Cardoso's journey from childhood on the island of Atauro, surrounded by folk stories and the scent of the "ai-dik-funam", to adolescence in the seminary and eventually joining other Timorese students in Lisbon. He soon realizes that this pilgrimage to the distant colonial fatherland is in fact an exile. In his absence, the Indonesian invasion forces a second wave of the Timorese diaspora -including Cardoso's ailing father - from whom he learns the first details of the fate of his fellow Timorese.
Reviews
'Luis Cardoso's book reads like a novel, but is definitely not fiction. It is a beautifully written story of his life, finely intertwined with the tragedy of East Timor Contemporary Review
Author Bio
The son of a native nurse, Luis Cardoso was educated at various mission schools and won a scholarship to Lisbon in 1974, just after the Portuguese Revolution. Since returning to Timor, he has served on the Maubere Resistance National Committee, and worked as a reporter, a teacher and a storyteller. He is now in Lisbon. This is his first book:
