José Saramago

Nobel Site for Literature - Autobiography: "I was born in a family of landless peasants, in Azinhaga, a small village in the province of Ribatejo, on the right bank of the Almonda River, around a hundred kilometres north-east of Lisbon. My parents were Jos� de Sousa and Maria da Piedade. Jos� de Sousa would have been my own name had not the Registrar, on his own inititiave added the nickname by which my father's family was known in the village: Saramago. I should add that saramago is a wild herbaceous plant, whose leaves in those times served at need as nourishment for the poor. Not until the age of seven, when I had to present an identification document at primary school, was it realised that my full name was Jos� de Sousa Saramago..."