"Land of sin": The «Element of God» in the first Saramago

Abstract

José Saramago’s public thinking and statements about religion would not have elicited as many reactions (positive and negative) if he had not written larger works such as The Gospel According to Jesus Christ and Cain. However, this theme does not arise only in these books by Saramago. In the writer’s first novel, Land of Sin (1947), the problems of religion and evil are already the great movers of the whole narrative and an eloquent illustration of José Saramago’s ideas regarding the religious universe and society in general (Portuguese and others too). These questions are not outlined with the force here as in his other books, but Saramago’s worldview is already very visible in this book, and also noteworthy, particularly if we remember the author’s youth, who was only twenty-four years old when he published the book.