Project

José Luandino Vieira's prison collection consists of 2000 fragile handwritten sheets, forming 17+1 notebooks that have been preserved unpublished for over 50 years. The collection is composed of diary notes, correspondences, postcards and drawings, popular songbooks, literary sketches and translation exercises, sayings and texts in Kimbundu, and journalistic clippings and notes. Papéis da Prisão is bookended in time and space by the entry into the PIDE Prison Pavilion in São Paulo, Luanda (1961) and the exit from Tarrafal (1972).

The project “José Luandino Vieira: Diários do Tarrafal – Digital Collection” is the continuation of the project “José Luandino Vieira: Diários do Tarrafal (2013-2015)”, which gave rise to the publication Papéis da Prisão: apontamentos, diário, correspondência (1962-1971).

“José Luandino Vieira: Diários do Tarrafal – Digital Collection” aimed to organise, conserve and present the prison collection of José Luandino Vieira in a digital format. It was carried out by Margarida Calafate Ribeiro, Roberto Vecchi, Mónica V. Silva, Helena Rebelo and Nuno Simão Gonçalves at the Center for Social Studies of the University of Coimbra, with funding from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.