Ciro Capão

Among the arts, writing certainly holds a special place. Not only is it integral to our history, our culture, our very way of life and even how our biological brains develop, it is also something anyone can do with just a pen and a piece of paper (or a keyboard and screen). It has almost no costs or barriers to entry. But, as with every skill, it takes practice, effort and dedication.

It still astounds me how words can be strung together and give birth to entire worlds, entire universes, infinite possibilities and genres and styles and tastes. I love reading. Since I was a child, I have been obsessed with it, frequently staying up all night and sleeping during class, even sneaking in books to read during recess. It opened my mind, it taught me about life and about all that might be. It taught me human nature and science. It made me who I am today: a huge nerd.

My father was a true man of the written word, and he worked directly with books, and as such I got to meet all kinds of professional writers, including some of the biggest names of Lusophone literature, masters whose skills I can only dream of. But, through my father and them, I saw the decline of readership firsthand. I saw it in Mozambique, in Portugal, and now in Brazil. There are certainly few places in the world where you won’t see this trend: people are reading less and less, and we risk losing something precious. How many worlds will we never discover because the would-be author never gave it a chance? How many wonderful and quirky characters will we never meet? How many ideas that guide technological development themselves will never be born?

I plunged head-first into the world of fiction when my mother tricked me into reading Asimov's collections (by telling me not to read them), and have been not just a voracious reader ever since, but have been crafting fantastical and strange worlds in my head. It is what I have always done in the shower, or when waiting in line at the grocery store, or even when people are talking to me about non-nerdy things. But it wasn't until recently that I scrounged up the courage to just put my worlds out there, not just keep them for myself, and I have found a new passion.

All of which leads me to why I'm out here shouting into the void. I don't expect to quit my day job or go viral, I just hope a few people out there will plunge into the worlds swirling inside my own demented mind, and who knows, maybe a select few will like what I have to say.