The Mystery of the Sintra Road
ISBN 9781909232297 | |
The Mystery of the Sintra Road (
Background
The authors first met when Eça de Queirós was a student of Ortigão at the Colégio da Irmandade da Lapa in Porto. The friendship also resulted in collaboration on a monthly magazine As Farpas (1871–83), which caricatured Portuguese life. The friendship lasted throughout their lives, and Ortigão was with Eça when the latter died in Switzerland.[2][3]
Despite his young age of 24 at the time of publication, Eça de Queirós had already visited Egypt as a journalist for the
Beginning in January, 2017 Diário de Notícias re-issued the novel as a serialization of 20 instalments, based on the third edition of the book rather than the original newspaper version.[2] .
The story
Two friends, one of whom is a doctor and the other known only as “F”, are kidnapped on the way back to Lisbon from Sintra by three masked men and taken to a mysterious house. In the house they discover a corpse. The doctor is asked to confirm the death and identify the cause. In the early hours another man, known only as A.M.C., enters the house and is detained. He appears to know already of the death and says that the deceased died of opium poisoning but denies involvement. The doctor is subsequently released, without “F”. To strengthen the impression for the newspaper's readers that this is a true story the next instalment is an anonymous letter from “Z”, a friend of A.M.C., who reports that A.M.C. has gone missing. However, the letter stresses that he could not have been the murderer as he was with friends at the time of the death. This is followed by a letter to the doctor from “F”, describing his captivity and indicating that the neighbouring house is supposed to be haunted and is occupied by a German investigating the paranormal, or spiritism, with whom he communicates through a hole in the party wall and to whom he gives the letter for the doctor. However, he fails to ask the German the address of the house in which he is held, although he concludes that it is in Lisbon and may well be a gambling den.[6][7]
Following another letter from “Z” to again defend A.M.C., one of the kidnappers, identified only as the “tall masked man”, then writes a lengthy letter to the paper. This introduces an English officer called Captain Rytmel, and the reader learns of the captain's involvement with the masked man's cousin, Countess W., and of his survival of an earlier murder attempt by a former lover, Carmen, who subsequently died. The tall masked man's letter is followed by a letter from A.M.C. in which he describes how he became involved in the whole affair. He confirms the reader's assumption that the deceased is Captain Rytmel, and informs the reader that the murderer has been summoned to the house to be judged by the three masked men, “F”, and A.M.C. This section is followed by a letter from the murderer, explaining how the death happened. The last instalment includes a note announcing that the story was fiction, signed by its two authors.[8]
Criticism
The instalments and the subsequent book were well received by the public. Recent criticism considers that this enthusiasm was justified. While the book does include passages of excessive Romanticism that sound bloated to contemporary ears, it is an exciting story in which the characters "are flawed and pathetic without being pitiable."[9]
Dramatisation
The novel was made into a film (O Mistério da Estrada de Sintra) in 2007, directed by Jorge Paixão da Costa.
References
- ^ a b "O Mistério da Estrada de Sintra". Luso Livros. Retrieved 11 May 2018.
- ^ a b c Pereira, Mariana. ""O Mistério da Estrada de Sintra". Dois velhos amigos voltam ao DN". Diário de Notícias. Retrieved 11 May 2018.
- ^ "As farpas: chronica mensal da politica das letras e dos costumes, Lisboa, 1871-1883". Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal. Retrieved 12 May 2018.
- ISBN 9781909232297.
- ISBN 9781909232297.
- ^ Ignacio, Jose. "Forgotten Book: The Mystery of the Sintra Road (1870), by Eca de Queiroz and Ramalho Ortigão". Retrieved 14 May 2018.
- ^ "*talk about fake news: The Mystery of the Sintra Road, by Eça de Queiróz and Ramalho Ortigão". the crime segments. Retrieved 14 May 2018.
- ^ "Mistério da Estrada de Sintra - Resumo". C.I.T.I. Retrieved 14 May 2018.
- ^ "The Mystery of the Sintra Road". Library Thing. Retrieved 14 May 2018.