Heart, Head and Stomach - Coming Soon!

8th House Publishing is proud to announce the first-ever English translation of Heart, Head and Stomach (Coração, Cabeça e Estômago), the celebrated satirical novel by Camilo Castelo Branco (1825–1890), one of the greatest and most prolific writers in Portuguese literature.

First published in 1862, the novel traces the life of Silvestre da Silva through the three ruling forces named in its title. In the first, the heart holds sway: a young Silvestre chases love across a libertine Lisbon and meets only with disillusionment. In the second, the head takes command, and he turns a calculating eye toward the wealthy heiresses of Porto. In the third, the stomach rules, and he withdraws to Soutelo, his ancestral home, in search of a quieter, more comfortable life.

Presented as the posthumous papers of its hapless hero, Heart, Head and Stomach is a sharp and strikingly modern satire of romantic ideals, social ambition, and bourgeois hypocrisy — fiction that anticipates the realism still to come. This new translation by Francis More brings the book to English-language readers in a fresh, faithful rendering.

Publication details and a release date will follow.