What is José Saramago?
{{Nobelprize|Literature}} {{Infobox Writer | name = José de Sousa Saramago | image = JSJoseSaramago.jpg | imagesize = 250px | caption = | pseudonym = | birth_date = {{birth date|1922|11|16}} | birth_place = [[Azinhaga]], [[Ribatejo]], [[Portugal]] | death_date = {{death date and age|2010|06|18|1922|11|16|mf=y}} | death_place = [[Lanzrote]], [[Spain]] | occupation = [[Playwright]], [[Novelist]] | nationality = [[Portugal]] | period = 1947-present | genre = | subject = | movement = | notableworks = [[Baltasar and Blimunda]], [[The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis]] | website = | footnotes = }} {{nobelprize|Literature}}'''José de Sousa Saramago''', (pronounced|ʒuˈzɛ sɐɾɐˈmagu; born November 16, 1922; died June 18, 2010) was a [[Portugal|Portuguese]] [[writer]], [[playwright]] and [[journalist]]. Saramago was awarded the [[Nobel Prize in Literature]] in 1998. He lived on [[Lanzarote]] in the [[Canary Islands]], [[Spain]]. == Biography == Saramago was born into a family of landless peasants in [[Azinhaga]], [[Portugal]], a small village in the province of [[Ribatejo]] some hundred kilometers north-east of [[Lisbon]]. Saramago married Ilda Reis in 1944. Their only child, Violante, was born in 1947. Since 1988, Saramago has been married to the [[Spain|Spanish]] journalist Pilar del Río, who is the official translator of his books into Spanish. José Saramago was in his mid-fifties before he had international success; his novel ''Baltasar and Blimunda'' brought him an international readership. This novel won the Portuguese PEN Club Award. Saramago was a member of the Portuguese [[Communism|Communist Party]] from 1969, until his death <ref>http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1998/bio-bibl.html Nobel Prize citation, 1998</ref> as well as an [[atheist]]<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.plcs.umassd.edu/plcs7texts/monteiro.doc|title=The God Factor|publisher=|access-date=2008-02-20|archive-date=2009-03-06|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090306173326/http://www.plcs.umassd.edu/plcs7texts/monteir