Jorge and Zélia in front of the House.

The House is gorgeous and blue. Outcropped with arched cutouts of windows, is façade dominates the plaza.

Come to think of it, no other location would do. Everyone who is familiar with the City of Bahia and the writings of Jorge Amado agrees that the institution that bears his name should be housed right here. The Jorge Amado House Foundation could have no other address but Largo do Pelourinho, the setting of Jorge's stories, the melting pot where the seasoning is added to the bizarre humanity of this bubbling metropolis of different ethnicities, customs and cultures and come together to form the mortar of this Mediterranean mixed-race society which embraces an island-dotted gulf, and whose capital, the City of Salvador da Bahia de Todos os Santos, is the third side of a triangle whose base reclines between Africa and Iberia.

Standing in the heart of the so-called Historic Center, a UNESCO-listed site, the House commands a fantastic view: sloping centuries-old streets, town-houses with austere façades and gracious eaves; tiled roofs that climb as far as the eye can see, and further on, the waters of the bay where, on the clearest days, the silhouette of a beach slips into view, more divined than seen by dazzled eyes.

Inhabiting this House is an exercise in beauty. We need no other watchtower to contemplate this exuberant scene.

But the House has a future set out from the beginning when it was nothing but a dream. A house of literature, a workshop for words. A confluence of ideas that spring from dialogue, exchanges of information, the pleasure of discovery, things lost and found in this fantastic world of creation and conviviality.

This House must never become a mere depository for documents. That was the wish of the author Jorge Amado, whose literary works are this institution's greatest resource. He wanted it to be an increasingly permanent, vibrant and active Center: "I want the sense of life in Bahia to fill this House and be the sentiment of its existence. In addition to research and study, it should also be a place for encounters and cultural exchange between Bahia and other places."

www.jorgeamado.org.br