I previously highlighted the first Brazilian Portuguese translation of I Am Legend, Mundo de Vampiros from 1958. The next known to me would not arrive until 1981, as part of Francisco Alves' Masters of Horror and Fantasy series, under the direct translation Eu Sou a Lenda. The cover creatures almost prefigure the infected from the Will Smith film; and while Neville is not represented, it's worth noting that the dog is!
I was surprised that just three years later, the same publisher would reissue the same translation under a different title: A Última Esperança sobre a Terra (The Last Hope on Earth). That was the title used for The Omega Man in Brazil, so it would seem they were going for a broader audience with the new edition. It's interesting that despite the new title, the cover art (by Antonio Jeremias) is not evocative of the Heston film at all — to me it looks like James Franciscus as Neville and a Claudia Cardinale as Ruth? And what's with the Russian architecture on the skyline? All that said, it is one of the more eye-catching cover paintings on a foreign edition.
Cover art and title notwithstanding, the two editions are otherwise nearly identical. The blurb on the back is actually a passage from the ending of the novel — SPOILER ALERT!
And as these copies came to me by way of Matheson's personal archive, both are signed by the author.
It's also interesting to note that the copyright page explicitly states that the books are not to be sold in Portugal or Portuguese-speaking countries — strange given that Brazil is a Portuguese-speaking country!
Check back next week for another item from the I Am Legend Archive!
