The singing of souls

Author of various works of fiction, including for the youth public, was popular in the best sense of the term and a tireless promoter of the history of Portugal. The general public will surely know its remarkable first novel, THE VOICE OF THE GODSfrom 1984, an inspired and inspiring trip to Lusitania whose reading so many enchanted, but less will know I saw the III Reich dieby Manuel Homem de Mello, an important and rare historical testimony, which Aguiar coordinated and commented.

In a country like ours, where the publication of memories is rare, it is sometimes necessary a driving to achieve it. This is the case of this work, which reports the memories of Manuel Homem de Mello, at the beginning of his diplomatic career, as the second secretary of the Portugal Legation in Berlin, between 1941 and 1945.

Until the publication of this book, the only report of a Portuguese who witnessed the end of the national socialist regime was How I saw the end of the war in Germanyfrom the Viscount of Porto da Cruz, whose first edition is from 1946. Thanks to João Aguiar, we came to us another valuable account of those who lived this twilight of the gods closely.

According to him explains in the introduction, he met the ambassador Man of Mello in the 1960s while working in the direction of one of his children in Brussels. Invited to go to Bad Godesberg, where the official residence of Manuel Homem de Mello was located, then Ambassador of Portugal in the Federal Republic of Germany, he heard several times the « memories of the stormy years in Berlin. » Aware of their importance, he immediately insisted on what he published, but « it took 12 years to convince him … » In November 1982, with the first edition of the book in preparation, the ambassador Homem de Mello passed away and this would only come out the following year.

In João Aguiar’s long work there is a small book that, despite being curious and pertinent, is the least known. The ordering of souls It is the story of a meeting of different generations and social media caused by the escape to the globalized world. This said it seems like a boring sociological essay, but it is actually a simple and even touching story that tells us like an old and brazeny old, D. Gonçalo, leaves everything to go to the village where he finds a young ‘simple moor’, Zé da Pinta. This friendship as unlikely as revealing is the result of the refusal of a world without magic in which they do not identify themselves, described with mastery and irony by Aguiar.

When D. Gonçalo speaks to Zé da Pinta in Moura enchanted, he is amazed, because “heard, I did not know when even where, talk about enchanted Moors. But it was a hasty and vague mention. No one had explained anything to him because no one knew anything, already. In the world where he had always lived, people knew football and Totoloto, the contests and the reality showsvibrated with stories that took place in the United States of America or Brussels; The most fortunate and distinct even had access to satellite and internet pornography. But from enchanted Moors no one knew and, by the truth, no one wanted to know. ‘ This book was published in 1995, but Aguiar could well have written it today.

Fifteen years after his death, when the homeland history became a preferential target of the so -called « cancellation culture » and the global leveling erases the charm of our land and our people, João Aguiar continues to sing and his work to enchant.