Frederico Lourenço

Frederico Lourenço (* 1963 in Lisbon ) is a Portuguese classical philologist , translator, Germanist , university professor and writer. As an author, he is primarily active as a poet , novelist and essayist .

Lourenço is considered one of the most important experts in the field of Greek studies on the Iberian Peninsula . Among other things, he translated Homer and Arthur Schnitzler into Portuguese and works as a translator of the Bible from ancient Greek into Portuguese.

Life

Lourenço was born as the son of Manuel António dos Santos Lourenço (1936-2009), a well-known editor , translator, professor and writer. From the age of two he lived in Oxford and London for a good ten years , where his father worked as a lecturer. After returning to Portugal he attended the French Lyceum Charles Perrier in Lisbon and learned German at the Goethe Institute in Lisbon. He then majored in Classical Philology with a focus on ancient Greek history, literature and language and graduated from the University of Lisbon in Classical Philology in 1988. He wrote his dissertation on the lyrical texts of Euripides . He then worked as a lecturer in the same subject at the University of Lisbon and switched to the University of Coimbra as a lecturer in 2009 .

Since 2015 he has been working on a mammoth project, the easy-to-understand, but text-oriented translation of the entire Bible, i.e. all 80 books of the Bible, from ancient Greek, the completion of which is planned for 2019. It is part of his "Biblioteca Grega" project, which tries to translate all ancient Greek literature into modern Portuguese. New translations of Homer's Iliad (2003) and Odyssey (2005) have already been completed .

As a translator, he was also responsible for the translations of Arthur Schnitzler's work and of Don Carlos by Friedrich von Schiller , whose translation was also performed at the Lisbon Teatro da Cornucópia in Lisbon, in a production by Luís Miguel Cintra in 2008 . In addition, he works as a film essayist for various newspapers such as Independente , Expresso , Público or Diario de Noticias and wrote articles a. a. about Howard Hawks , Frank Capra and Ernst Lubitsch . Many texts were written about Portuguese film history .

His talent for languages and his enthusiasm for foreign languages were already evident as a child. He speaks German fluently and without an accent. He treats his homosexuality discreetly; it is only mentioned in the printed press.

In 2002 he received the prize of the Portuguese PEN Club , in 2006 the Prémio David Mourão-Ferreira . In 2016 he received the Prémio Pessoa , which has been awarded annually since 1987 to a Portuguese person who has made a special contribution to scientific, artistic or literary work.

Work (selection)

Pode um desejo imenso, Roman, 2002.
A formosa Pintura da Mundo, short stories, 2005.
Novos Ensaios Helénicos e Alemães (2008), essays from German and Greek.
Santo Asinha e outros poemas, 2010, poetry.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME	Lourenço, Frederico
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Portuguese classical philologist, translator, Germanist, university professor and writer
DATE OF BIRTH	1963
PLACE OF BIRTH	Lisbon