The Missing Head of Damasceno Monteiro by Antonio Tabucchi
Italian novelist Antonio Tabucchi was born in Pisa in 1943 and died in Portugal last weekend at the age of 68. Tabucchi was the author of more than two dozen novels, including 1994's "Pereira Declares," and 1997's "The Missing Head of Damascenio Monteiro," a crime novel about the discovery of a headless man. Below is an excerpt from the beginning of "The Missing Head," courtesy of New Directions.
Italian novelist Antonio Tabucchi was born in Pisa in 1943 and died in Portugal last weekend at the age of 68. One of Italy's most renowned postmodern writers, Tabucchi was the author of more than two dozen novels, including 1994's Pereira Declares, and 1997's The Missing Head of Damascenio Monteiro, a crime novel about a police investigation following the discovery of a headless man. During his life, Tabucchi was an accomplished academic, philosopher, and a devoted champion of Portuguese literature—he taught Portuguese literature at the University of Siena in Italy—as well as the foremost