I'm Still Here
Marcelo Rubens Paiva author Daniel Hahn translator Alison Entrekin translator
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Charco Press
Publishing:13th Oct '26
£11.99
This title is due to be published on 13th October, and will be despatched as soon as possible.
Winner of the Academy Award for Best Foreign Feature.
When Marcelo Rubens Paiva was 11 years old, his father was tortured to death by the Brazilian dictatorship. 25 years later, his mother, Eunice, helped usher into law a way for the families of the regime’s victims to finally have their deaths formally acknowledged, and allow them to seek compensation. In between, the unspooling of Brazilian democracy, and then the terrors and everydayness of life under the dictatorship, are where Paiva discovers his mother, and himself.
Eunice Paiva—who always preferred reading a novel to cavorting with her children, who was charming, and glamorous, and who never let anyone see her cry—responded to the shock of her widowhood by going back to law school in her 40s while raising five children alone, and then becoming a heroic advocate for Brazil’s indigenous people. For her only son, his father’s death catapulted him from a childhood spent playing soccer on the beach in Rio into the rest of his life, one characterized by the awe, and confusion, of a young man, still in mourning, watching his relentless, brilliant mother plunge their family ever forward.
I’m Still Here is the wry, deeply evocative, and endlessly compassionate story of how a family went from raucous, sun-soaked relative innocence to a deep and abiding commitment to justice—not just for themselves, but for democracy, the marginalized, and the truth itself. “Carry on. Keep going. Wait for another bonfire to be lit on high, another beam of light to guide the way back to the coast, to solid ground.”
"The chief focus of Marcelo Rubens Paiva’s book is essentially his mother’s quiet heroism — first as she single-handedly shoulders the responsibility of keeping the family together and protected, concealing her grief when the inevitable is confirmed, and subsequently when she earns a law degree at 48 and becomes active in a number of causes. That includes pushing for full acknowledgment from authorities of disappeared people like Rubens after democracy is returned to the country." —The Hollywood Reporter
"Walter Salles has based his film on a memoir, also called I’m Still Here, written by Marcelo Rubens Paiva, that pieces together his mother’s memories of her husband’s disappearance (...). Salles has a purpose here. He is clearly not simply recording what happened; this is a film of political advocacy, warning against forgetting what tyranny did to the country and the stains it left behind. As much as it is a celebration, it is his defence of Brazil." —Deadline
"I’m Still Here: a book that is a tribute to the rescue of memory." —O Estado de S. Paulo
"The book, which crosses the stories of Rubens Paiva, Eunice and Joaquim, is also a way for Marcelo to recount the experience of an upper middle class family in São Paulo transformed by a coup d'état like that of 1964. He looks to the past to see different heroes than those elected by the Left and the Right forces. For the writer, his parents are not only domestic heroes but also of a civil resistance that repudiated the 21 years of military rule." —UOL Noticias
"In dark times, when many are being seduced by the promises of a repressive regime, this is a must-read." —Escotilha
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Praise for Marcelo Rubens Paiva
The book that inspired the Walter Salles-directed film starring Golden Globe winner Fernanda Torres and nominated for 3 categories at the 2025 Oscars, including Best Picture.
"...And perhaps most crucially, having the film end with Eunice’s now even more extended clan gathered once again in an airy garden for a smiling family photograph, turns it into a cautionary tale, addressed to those forces in Brazil and beyond, who would seek a return to repression and rule by fear. The national spirit you seek to subdue will outlast you. The people you try to oppress will live to see you reviled and rejected by history, while those who resist will have songs and stories written about them. They will inspire music and art in celebration of their lives and will have movies as heartsore and beautiful as I’m Still Here made in their honor."Variety review for the I’m Still Here film adaptation
ISBN: 9781917260305
Dimensions: unknown
Weight: unknown
272 pages