Nuno Pires Soares
nhpsoares@fcsh.unl.pt
Centro Interdisciplinar de Ciências Sociais da Universidade Nova de Lisboa (CICS.Nova), Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal
For citation: SOARES, Nuno Pires – Lisboa Esboço Geográfico Critical Review. Separata do Boletim Cultural da Junta Distrital de Lisboa, III Série-N 82-1976, composto e Impresso nas Oficinas Gráficas de Ramos, Afonso & Moita, Lda. Lisboa: 1976, 205 pp., ilustrado. Estudo Prévio 12. Lisboa: CEACT/UAL – Centro de Estudos de Arquitetura, Cidade e Território da Universidade Autónoma de Lisboa, 2017. ISSN: 2182-4339 [Disponível em: www.estudoprevio.net]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.26619/2182-4339/12.3
Review received on 15 November 2017 and accepted for publication on 17 December 2018.
Creative Commons, licença CC BY-4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
This book’s interpretation of the city of Lisbon is still impressive to today’s readers in view of its perspective and geographical knowledge.
LISBOA Esboço Geográfico includes a well thought of and detailed plan. The first two chapters, “Lisboa: uma cidade sem par no país” and “Lisboa e a sua expansão”, are exceptional in terms of interpretation and analysis. It is a crucial text for those who wish to know Lisbon, to understand the changes the city has undergone, in a geographical context that has both boosted and conditioned its life. The chapter entitled “A aglomeração de Lisboa”, devoted to areas outside the administrative limits of the city – to the northern outskirts, “Subúrbios a norte da cidade”, and the southern outskirts, “Desenvolvimento da margem sul” -, explaining an essentially metropolitan dynamics that a larger part of Portuguese society still struggled to understand at the time.
The text is published in 1976 in Boletim Cultural of Junta Distrital de Lisboa, and again in 1977. In the first edition, the author already states that the text was under revision in late 1973 and its publication had been postponed due to the revolution in April 1974. A large part of the statistical data is prior to the 1970s. However, it is affirmed that the most significant changes that occurred after April 25, 1974, were included in the text.
This small note evidences how careful and accurate the text is, both in regards to the information provided and to the reader.
The author shows great concern in using terms to express her interpretations and explanations that are both accurate and understandable to a large number of potential readers. This is rather uncommon in academic texts. Noteworthy is the fact that the author uses statistical data and mapping, basic or thematic, to support her statements. The photographic appendix (ESTAMPAS), an important document, is especially useful. The aim of this text is to disclose, explain and teach using an elegant, clear, summary and objective style. This is clearly a research text written by a person who knows and wants to teach. This is typical of the author’s wide research work.
In “Lisboa Esboço Geográfico”, an excellent title, we can find information on Urban History, Physical Geography, Human Geography, Economic Geography, Demography and Regional Planning. A few years later, not surprisingly, Raquel Soeiro de Brito is responsible for the first degree in Portugal on Geography and Regional Planning.
This is a reference text on the Geography of the city of Lisbon. It is still a crucial text for those who want to know the city and its metropolitan region up to the 1970s. Curiously, no one has dared to continue the text that professor Raquel Soeiro de Brito so brilliantly wrote. The city deserved a new chapter on what has changed and what has remained unaltered in the past 40 years.
While we wait for “Lisboa Esboço Geográfico II”, we can reread the first volume.
Nuno Pires Soares
This was the first book I voluntarily purchased while studying Geography and Regional Planning.