Ana Luísa Amaral

Ana Luísa Amaral (5 April 1956 – 5 August 2022)^[1] was a Portuguese poet. Professor at the University of Porto, she held a Ph.D. on the poetry of Emily Dickinson and had academic publications (in Portugal and abroad) in the areas of English and American poetry, comparative poetics, and feminist studies. She was a senior researcher and co-director of the Institute for Comparative Literature Margarida Losa. Co-author (with Ana Gabriela Macedo) of the Dictionary of Feminist Criticism (Afrontamento, 2005) and responsible for the annotated edition of New Portuguese Letters (Dom Quixote, 2010) and the coordinator of the international project New Portuguese Letters 40 Years Later,^[2] financed by FCT, that involves 10 countries and over 60 researchers. Editor of several academic books, such as Novas Cartas Portuguesas entre Portugal e o Mundo (with Marinela Freitas, Dom Quixote, 2014), or New Portuguese Letters to the World^[3] (with Marinela Freitas, Peter Lang, 2015).

Ana Luísa Amaral

Prior to her death, she was preparing a book of poetry, a novel, and two books of essays. In 2021, a book of essays on her work by Peter Lang (ed. Claire Williams) titled The Most Perfect Excess: The Works of Ana Luísa Amaral was published.

Several plays were staged around her work, such as O olhar diagonal das coisas, A história da Aranha Leopoldina, Próspero Morreu, or Como Tu. On April 1, 2022, she was awarded the rank of Commander of the Military Order of Sant'Iago da Espada. The insignia was only awarded on August 6, 2022, posthumously, to Ana Luísa Amaral's daughter.^[4]

She died on August 5, 2022, at the age of 66.^[5]

Literary career edit

Amaral's first volume of poetry, Minha Senhora de Quê (Mistress of What), was published in 1990. The collection's title alluded to Maria Teresa Horta's 1971 volume Minha Senhora de Mim (Milady of Me), thereby explicitly inscribing Amaral's work into the emergent genealogy of Portuguese women’s poetry.^[6] Since then, she has published fifteen further original collections of poetry and two volumes of collected poems, in addition to several translations (including poetry by Emily Dickinson, John Updike and Louise Glück) and books for children.

Amaral's poetry has been translated into several languages and volumes of her writings have been published in the United States of America, United Kingdom, Germany, Spain, France, Brazil, Italy, Sweden, Holland, Venezuela, Colombia, Hong Kong, Mexico and Slovenia. She is also represented in many Portuguese and international anthologies. Her work has been awarded several distinctions such as the Gold Medal of Câmara Municipal de Matosinhos and the Gold Medal of Câmara Municipal do Porto, for "services to literature", or the Medaille de la Ville de Paris, and several literary prizes, such as the Correntes d’Escritas Literary Prize, o Premio di Poesia Giuseppe Acerbi, o Great Prize for Poetry of the Portuguese Writers' Association, the António Gedeão Prize, the Internazionale Fondazione Roma, Ritratti di Poesia Prize, o PEN Prize for Fiction, Prize for Essay from the Portuguese Association of Literary Critics, the Premio Leteo (Spain), Best Poetry Book of the Year from the Grémio de Librerias de Madrid, Vergílio Ferreira Prize, Sá de Miranda Literary Prize or the Premio Reina Sofía de Poesía Iberoamericana.

Books edit

Poetry edit

Minha senhora de quê, Fora do Texto, 1990; re., Quetzal, 1999
Coisas de partir, Fora do Texto, 1993; re., Gótica, 2001
Epopeias, Fora do Texto, 1994
E muitos os caminhos, Poetas de Letras, 1995
Às vezes o paraíso, Quetzal, 1998; re. 2000.
Imagens, Campo das Letras, 2000
Imagias, Gótica, 2002
A arte de ser tigre, Gótica, 2003
Poesia Reunida 1990–2005, Quasi, 2005
A génese do amor, Campo das Letras, 2005; 2nd edition, 2006
Entre dois rios e outras noites, Campo das Letras, 2008
Se fosse um intervalo, Dom Quixote, 2009
Inversos, Poesia 1990–2010, Dom Quixote, 2010
Vozes, Dom Quixote, 2011; 2nd edition 2012; 3rd edition 2015
Escuro, Assírio & Alvim, 2014
E Todavia, Assírio & Alvim, 2015
What's in a name, Assírio & Alvim, 2017
Ágora, Assírio & Alvim, 2019
Mundo, Assírio & Alvim, 2021 (forthcoming)

Essay edit

Arder a palavra e outros incêndios, Relógio D'Água, 2018

Theater edit

Próspero Morreu, Caminho, 2011

Fiction edit

Ara, Sextante, 2013

Children's books edit

Gaspar, o Dedo Diferente e Outras Histórias, (illust. Elsa Navarro), Campo das Letras, 1999
A História da Aranha Leopoldina, (illust. Elsa Navarro), Campo das Letras, 2000
A Relíquia, based on the novel by Eça de Queirós, Quasi, 2008
Auto de Mofina Mendes, based on the play by Gil Vicente, Quasi, 2008
A História da Aranha Leopoldina, (illust. Raquel Pinheiro), Civilização, 2010 (reviewed edition, with CD. Music by Clara Ghimel, and Nuno Aragão, sung by Rosa Quiroga, Nuno Aragão and Sissa Afonso)
Gaspar, o Dedo Diferente, (illust. Abigail Ascenso), Civilização, 2011 (reviewed edition)
A Tempestade, (illust. Marta Madureira), Quidnovi 2011 – Selected for the Portuguese National Reading Plan
Como Tu, (illust. Elsa Navarro), Quidnovi, 2012 (With CD – audiobook and songs, music of Antonio Pinho Vargas, piano by Álvaro Teixeira Lopes, voices of Pedro Lamares, Rute Pimenta and Ana Luísa Amaral – Selected for the Portuguese National Reading Plan
Lengalenga de Lena, a Hiena, (illust. Jaime Ferraz), Zero a Oito, 2019
A História da Aranha Leopoldina, (illust. Jaime Ferraz), Zero a Oito, 2019
Gaspar, o Dedo Diferente, (illust. Chico Bolila), Zero a Oito, 2019
Como Tu, (illust. Alberto Faria), Zero a Oito, 2020

Translations edit

Xanana Gusmão, Mar Meu/My Sea of Timor, co-transl. with Kristy Sword (Granito, 1998)
Eunice de Souza, Poemas Escolhidos (Cotovia, 2001)
John Updike, Ponto Último e Outros Poemas (Civilização, 2009)
Emily Dickinson, Cem Poemas (Relógio D'Água, 2010)
Emily Dickinson, Duzentos Poemas (Relógio d’Água, 2015)
Patricia Highsmith, Carol (Relógio d'Água, 2015)
William Shakespeare, 30 Sonetos (Relógio d'Água, 2015)
Mário de Sá-Carneiro, Seven Songs of Decline and Other Poems, co-trad. Margaret Jull Costa, ed. Ricardo Vasconcelos (Francis Boutle Publishers, 2020)
Louise Glück, A Íris Selvagem (Relógio d'Água, 2020)
Arnold Wesker, Primavera Selvagem (Edições Humus, 2020)
Louise Glück, Vita Nova (Relógio d'Água, 2021)
Emily Dickinson, Herbarium (Relógio d'Água, forthcoming)
Margaret Atwood, Políticas de Poder (Relógio d'Água, forthcoming)