José Maria de Eça de Queiroz or Eça de Queirós is generally considered to be the greatest Portuguese writer in the realist style. Zola considered him to be far greater than Flaubert. The London Observer critics rank him with Dickens, Balzac and Tolstoy. Eça never officially rejected Catholicism, and in many of his private letters he even invokes Jesus and uses expressions typical of Catholics, but was very critical of the Catholic Church of his time, and of Christianity in general as is evident in some of his novels. During his lifetime, the spelling was "Eça de Queiroz" and this is the form that appears on many editions of his works; the modern standard Portuguese spelling is "Eça de Queirós"

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