João Manuel Rosado Barreiros (born July 31, 1952), also known by the
pseudonym
A pseudonym (; ) or alias () is a fictitious name that a person assumes for a particular purpose, which differs from their original or true meaning ( orthonym). This also differs from a new name that entirely or legally replaces an individual's o ...
science fiction
Science fiction (often shortened to sci-fi or abbreviated SF) is a genre of speculative fiction that deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts. These concepts may include information technology and robotics, biological manipulations, space ...
writer, editor, translator and critic.
He graduated in
Philosophy
Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...
from the
University of Lisbon
The University of Lisbon (ULisboa; ) is a public university, public research university in Lisbon, and Portugal's largest university. It was founded in 1911, but the university's present structure dates to the 2013 merger of the former Universit ...
in 1977, and has been teaching it in
high school
A secondary school, high school, or senior school, is an institution that provides secondary education. Some secondary schools provide both ''lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper secondary education'' (ages 14 to 18), i.e., ...
since 1975. His experiences in education eventually led him to write a semi-autobiographical
satire
Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of exposin ...
titled "The Test" in 2000.
Fiction
Barreiros's writing style, influenced by that of
Robert Silverberg
Robert Silverberg (born January 15, 1935) is a prolific American science fiction author and editor. He is a multiple winner of both Hugo Award, Hugo and Nebula Awards, a member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame, and a SFWA Grand ...
and
James Tiptree, Jr
Alice Bradley Sheldon, better known as James Tiptree Jr. (born Alice Hastings Bradley; August 24, 1915 – May 19, 1987), was an American people, American science fiction and fantasy author. It was not publicly known until 1977 that James Tiptre ...
, is distinctively sardonic and shows a marked tendency towards satire and
black comedy
Black comedy, also known as black humor, bleak comedy, dark comedy, dark humor, gallows humor or morbid humor, is a style of comedy that makes light of subject matter that is generally considered taboo, particularly subjects that are normally ...
.
His plots frequently employ unlikeable
protagonist
A protagonist () is the main character of a story. The protagonist makes key decisions that affect the plot, primarily influencing the story and propelling it forward, and is often the character who faces the most significant obstacles. If a ...
s in
dystopic
A dystopia (lit. "bad place") is an imagined world or society in which people lead wretched, dehumanized, fearful lives. It is an imagined place (possibly state) in which everything is unpleasant or bad, typically a totalitarian or environmenta ...
settings, where they are faced with the brutality of everyday life and are often thwarted by their own actions in the end. The stories tend to offer extremely graphic depictions of violence, and utterly reject
political correctness
"Political correctness" (adjectivally "politically correct"; commonly abbreviated to P.C.) is a term used to describe language, policies, or measures that are intended to avoid offense or disadvantage to members of particular groups in society. ...
and its icons —
Walt Disney
Walter Elias Disney ( ; December 5, 1901December 15, 1966) was an American animator, film producer, voice actor, and entrepreneur. A pioneer of the Golden age of American animation, American animation industry, he introduced several develop ...
and
Sesame Street
''Sesame Street'' is an American educational television, educational children's television series that combines live-action, sketch comedy, animation, and puppetry. It is produced by Sesame Workshop (known as the Children's Television Worksh ...
are frequent targets of derision by Barreiros, for example, and he has gone so far as to cast Big Bird analogues as the principal
antagonist
An antagonist is a character in a story who is presented as the main enemy or rival of the protagonist and is often depicted as a villain.English,
Spanish
Spanish might refer to:
* Items from or related to Spain:
**Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain
**Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many countries in the Americas
**Spanish cuisine
**Spanish history
**Spanish culture
...
Italian
Italian(s) may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries
** Italians, a Romance ethnic group related to or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom
** Italian language, a Romance languag ...
Brazil
Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...
ian Nova Award, offered by fans to the best foreign short story published in
South America
South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...
, for "Um Dia com Júlia na Necrosfera" (in 1992) and "A Arder Caíram os Anjos" (in 1994). He was won the Adamastor Prize for Short Stories in 2014 with "O Coração é um Predador Solitário".
Miscellaneous activity
João Barreiros's book and film reviews have appeared in publications such as '' Público'', '' O Independente'', ''Ler'' and ''Os Meus Livros''. The mercilessness of Barreiros's criticism earned him a reputation among Portuguese science fiction fans, and his
titanium
Titanium is a chemical element; it has symbol Ti and atomic number 22. Found in nature only as an oxide, it can be reduced to produce a lustrous transition metal with a silver color, low density, and high strength, resistant to corrosion in ...
nib
fountain pen
A fountain pen is a writing instrument that uses a metal nib (pen), nib to apply Fountain pen ink, water-based ink, or special pigment ink—suitable for fountain pens—to paper. It is distinguished from earlier dip pens by using an internal r ...
gained legendary status as a result.
During the 1980s and early 1990s, Barreiros edited two science fiction and fantasy labels for Editora Clássica and Gradiva. Among the writers he introduced to a Portuguese audience are Iain M. Banks,
William Gibson
William Ford Gibson (born March 17, 1948) is an American-Canadian speculative fiction writer and essayist widely credited with pioneering the science fiction subgenre known as cyberpunk. Beginning his writing career in the late 1970s, his ear ...
Dan Simmons
Dan Simmons (born April 4, 1948) is an American science fiction and horror writer. He is the author of the Hyperion Cantos and the Ilium/Olympos cycles, among other works that span the science fiction, horror, and fantasy genres, sometimes ...
Source:João Barreiros at Bibliowiki. Retrieved on 2009-08-11.
* ''Duas fábulas tecnocráticas'' (collection, 1977)
* ''O caçador de brinquedos e outras histórias'' (collection, 1994)
* ''Terrarium: Um romance em mosaicos'' (with Luís Filipe Silva, 1996)
* ''Disney no céu entre os Dumbos'' (2001 nline 2006 rint
* ''A verdadeira invasão dos marcianos'' (2004)
* ''A sombra sobre Lisboa'' (contributor, 2006)
* ''A bondade dos estranhos: Projecto Candyman'' (2007)
* ''Se acordar antes de morrer'' (collection, 2010)
* ''Lisboa no ano 2000'' (editor and contributor, 2013)
*Crazy Equóides (2018)