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Culture The cultural scene in Lisbon today is a vibrant collage of old and new, as the ghosts of Lisbon’s grand past echo evocatively around the city’s contemporary venues. Lisbon offers a formidable number of venues and companies can often be found performing in a wide variety of sites, such as outdoor parks and national palaces. The fortnightly Follow me Lisboa publishes cultural listings. For visitors who want to try their hand at Portuguese, the municipal government publishes the monthly Agenda Cultural (website: www.hpv.pt/lisboa/agenda/outras.html), which has a comprehensive set of listings (there is an English summary during the summer months). Event tickets can be purchased at the Agência de Billetes para Espectáculos Públicos (ABEP) – there is a kiosk in the southeast corner of Praça dos Restauradores. Ticket Line (tel: (21) 712 0300) also offers tickets to many popular shows. Music: The Orquestra Sinfónica Portuguesa (Portuguese Symphony Orchestra) is now based at the Teatro Camões (tel: (21) 891 7753), at the former Expo98 site in the Parque das Nações. The Gulbenkian Orchestra and Gulbenkian Choir are among those whose concerts are held at one of the concert halls and open-air amphitheatre of the Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Avenida de Berna 45A (tel: (21) 793 5131), adjacent to the museum. The Teatro Nacional de São Carlos, Rua Serpa Pinto 9 (tel: (21) 346 8408), is where opera productions are staged during the September to June season. Classical concerts are also held here. Other classical music ensembles include the Sinfonietta de Lisboa (based at the Teatro Nacional de São Carlos) and the Orquestra Metropolitana de Lisboa. Another major venue is the Coliseu dos Recreios, Rua das Portas Santo Antão 92 (tel: (21) 343 1677). Theatre: Among Lisbon’s attractive theatres, the Teatro Nacional de Dona Maria II, Praça de Dom Pedro IV, Rossio (tel: (21) 325 0800), is the most striking. Theatre and opera productions are also hosted in the Pequeno and Grande Auditório (Small and Large Auditoria) of the Centro Cultural de Belém, Praça do Império (tel: (21) 361 2400 or 2444; website: www.ccb.pt). Most theatre performances in Lisbon are, naturally, in Portuguese, although there are also some in English. The classics are still well liked, despite the fact that contemporary Portuguese and political work is becoming increasingly popular. The Artistas Unidos is an alternative company that specialises in political theatre, often using the Teatro Municipal de São Luís, Rua António Maria Cardoso 40 (tel: (21) 346 1260 or 5358). Dance: The Portuguese National Ballet, Companhia Nacional de Bailado (website: www.cnb.pt), is based at the Teatro Camões, Parque das Nações. Other venues that host dance performances are the Centro Cultural de Belém, Praça do Império (tel: (21) 361 2400 or 2444; website: www.ccb.pt) and the Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Avenida de Berna 45A (tel: (21) 793 5131). Film: Films are almost always shown in the original language, with subtitles in Portuguese. For English-language films, the best bets are the multiplexes in the larger shopping centres. The Diário de Notícias newspaper has film listings. Mainstream theatres are Amoreiras, Avenida Engengeiro Duarte Pacheco (tel: (21) 387 8752) and Colombo, Centro Colombo, Avenida Luisada (tel:(21) 711 3200. There is a drive-in theatre at the north end of Parque das Nações, with films showing at 2200, at a cost of Esc1500/EUR7.50 per car. Arthouse film fans are also catered for at the Londres, Avenida de Roma 7A (tel: (21) 840 1313). The world’s oldest taxi driver and his 1928 Oldsmobile are the stars of the film, Lisboa Taxi (1996), which premiered in January 1997. Cultural events: Since the 16th century, the Procissão do Senhor dos Passos, a procession of violet-covered litters has passed through the Graça district on the second Sunday of Lent, in honour of Senhor dos Passos. The month of June sees some of Lisbon’s most popular festivals, honouring a number of saints, with parades and parties. Similar processions take place on saints’ days in many of the surrounding villages. Literary Notes Portugal’s most famous writer was Luís de Camões, whose 16th-century poem, Os Lusíadas (1572), captured the spirit of the Portuguese Empire. The other famous name is the poet Fernando Pessoa, born in Lisbon in 1888. In addition to his poems, Pessoa was involved with Orpheu magazine (founded in 1914), which made a significant contribution to the cultural discourse of the time. José Saramago, the Portuguese native who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1998, is the author of the 1989 tome, História de cerco de Lisboa (The History of the Siege of Lisbon), a fanciful retelling of the 1147 siege of the city. Lisbon appears in other nation’s works of literature as well. The 1755 earthquake, for example, appears as an important symbol in Voltaire’s Candide (1759). Henry Fielding moved to Lisbon for health reasons and died here after completing the Journal of a Voyage to Lisbon (1755). Other more recent works include Mario de Sa-Carneiro’s The Great Shadow (circa 1915), a collection of short stories set in Lisbon, and Cees Nooteboom’s The Following Story (1991), a surreal tale of a teacher who falls asleep in Amsterdam and awakes in Lisbon. |
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