Lúcio's Confession

Book excerpt: When in 1916, Mario de Sa-Carneiro committed suicide in Paris at the age of 26, he left behind him an extraordinary body of work, which dealt obsessively with the problems of identity, madness and solitude. Lucio's Confession is the first of his novels to be translated into English. A brilliant and remarkable short novel of great eroticism and enigmatic beauty Lucio's Confession is set in the fin de siecle artist circles of Paris and Lisbon. It deals with the friendship of two young Portuguese poets, Lucio and Ricardo de Loureiro, and their search for identity through love. When the bachelor Ricardo returns to Lisbon, to everyone's surprise he is accompanied by a wife. She, Marta, seems the perfect partner, and establishes an immediate rapport with his close friend Lucio on the latter's return from Paris. Soon they become lovers. Despite the passionate nature of their relationship, Lucio suspects that Marta is sharing her favours with Ricardo's other close friends. Something is not quite right. Where did this mysterious woman meet Ricardo, and, indeed who is she? Why does she never speak of her past and why is Ricardo conniving at her infidelity? Lucio's attempts to unravel this mystery have tragic and terrible consequences.