The novel Pereira Declares by Antonio Tabucchi is a complex story about a Portuguese journalist named Pereira.  The time period in which this novel was written in critical to understand the relationships and occurrences within the story.  Tabucchi uses Pereira's relationships to tell the story of that time period.  There is a young man whom he hires as an assistant who needs help hiding his cousin.  His cousin is against the rising dictatorship in Portugal. Pereira's wife also passed away two years ago, and he speaks to his wife's photograph.  He sees a doctor for his obesity, and he never publishes anything of importance.  Pereira's mundane lifestyle and loneliness is an interesting lens to view this time period through.
The theme of death is an interesting theme in this novel.  Pereira declares the he is a devout Catholic, but he struggles with the concept of the Resurrection.  He also hires his assistant to write obituaries for famous authors who have not yet passed away.  Pereira also cannot let his dead wife go.  He talks to her photograph daily, and cannot seem to move on.  This obsession with death is mentioned several times throughout the novel, but it is difficult to understand why Tabucchi continually mentions it. Perhaps, Tabucchi sees death as having a central role in that time period, or maybe he himself struggled with the idea of death.  The novel ends with the death of an innocent man, who is murdered by corrupt officials.  The theme of death builds up into this intense final scene, after which Pereira finally declares something of note.
This is a short novel that makes a profound statement about the corruption and sadness that was part of life in Portugal in the early 1900s.  Although Pereira is a weak character, Tabucchi gives him strength, by the end of the novel, to be a declaring voice against the dictatorships of that time.