Nobel-winning Portuguese novelist Jose Saramago’s body taken from Spain to Lisbon for funeral

Saramago’s body taken to Portugal for funeral

MADRID — The Jose Saramago Foundation says the Nobel-winning Portuguese novelist’s body is being flown from his home on on the Spanish Canary Island of Lanzarote for a funeral to be held in Lisbon.

Saramago’s body was put on a Portuguese air force C130 transport plane at Lanzarote airport and is being accompanied on a final journey home Saturday by his widow and son, Portugal’s culture minister, the novelist’s biographer and several friends and other relatives.

Saramago, 87, who won the 1998 Nobel literature prize and whose work is internationally admired for the clarity of its ideas despite a complex prose style, died Friday at his Lanzarote home after a long illness.

The foundation says Saramago’s body will be cremated at noon on Sunday.