Linda De Suza

Teolinda Joaquina de Sousa Lança, better known as Linda de Suza, was a Portuguese Lusophone and Francophone singer, actress and best-selling author. She was nicknamed the Singing French Icon of Portuguese Immigration. In the late 1970s, she managed to record music albums. Her works such as "Tiroli-Torola", "La fille qui pleurait", "Un Enfant peut faire le monde" and "L'Étrangère" drew a large audience in France. She topped her success with her performance at Paris Olympia. Linda de Suza sang fado, folk, ballads and popular songs in both French and Portuguese and was nicknamed "Amália of France" after Amália Rodrigues, to whom she paid tribute in her song "Amália". Amália Rodrigues, known as "Rainha do Fado" ("Queen of Fado") and was also nicknamed by the President of Portugal, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, as the Singing "French Icon of Portuguese Immigration". In 1984, Linda de Suza published her autobiography La Valise en Carton (The Cardboard Suitcase). The book was also published the same year in Portugal, as A Mala de Cartão. Her book was followed by a number of novels. La Valise en carton was adapted into the cinema-film miniseries A Mala de Cartão (1988), in 1988. All were successful. In 2013, the song "L'Étrangère" by Linda de Suza appears in one of the most popular European films of that year The Gilded Cage (2013) and is once again remembered by the various Portuguese communities that live in French-speaking countries. Linda de Suza died in France on 28 December 2022, at age 74, from complications of COVID-19.