Articles by Marcelo Mendes de Souza
Latin American Research Review, 2021
This article analyzes Jorge Luis Borges’s views on race, as he expressed them in personal convers... more This article analyzes Jorge Luis Borges’s views on race, as he expressed them in personal conversations with Adolfo Bioy Casares and vis-à-vis his fiction. In the conversations recorded by Bioy Casares, Borges emerges as a man of his time and his social class in the worst sense possible: racism, bigotry, and his self-constructed whiteness inform almost all of his controversial statements on blackness and on Brazilian people. The article aims to expose a cohesive racial discourse underlying not only Borges’s private conversations but also his narratives. The goal is to challenge the enduring views of Borges as a “universal” author, dissociated from history and society.
Comparative Literature Studies, 2017
Comparisons between Machado de Assis and Jorge Luis Borges share one commonality: they all fail t... more Comparisons between Machado de Assis and Jorge Luis Borges share one commonality: they all fail to mention any direct relation between the two authors. This article discusses a translation of Machado's "A Cartomante," published in Revista Multicolor de los Sábados, a literary magazine edited by Borges, as a direct link between them. It proceeds to analyze parallels between Machado's "A Cartomante" and Borges' "Eastman, el proveedor de iniquidades," both published in the same space, to finally undertake a close reading of the translation. It concludes that both stories are literary metafictional narrative experiences with genre fiction, initially aimed at expanding reading publics of modernizing Latin America. A new light is thrown in the understanding of these two writers; namely Machado is here recast as part of Borges' ever-expanding canon.
The focus of this article is on what I conceive as a form of comic-chronotope particular to Gilbe... more The focus of this article is on what I conceive as a form of comic-chronotope particular to Gilbert Hernandez. His works present a specific interconnection between time and space that radicalises the common chronotopic device of the comic form. I argue that, by carefully organising these essential elements (time and space) in a concrete whole within his narratives, Hernandez is also re-imaging his context, history and sense of identity with the use of the comic form. To make it visible, I will first analyse Hernandez’s Luba Comics (2000–2004), Chance in Hell (2007), to illustrate what I understand by comic-chronotope on a literal level, and also to highlight the use that Hernandez makes of it that is specific to the medium and that at the same time defines his voice. Finally, I will use Julio’s Day (2013) to discuss the unfolding of its spatial and temporal indicators into an explicit form of historicity.
Nesta entrevista, John Gledson fala sobre crônica como gênero, e sobre a antologia de crônicas br... more Nesta entrevista, John Gledson fala sobre crônica como gênero, e sobre a antologia de crônicas brasileiras publicada em Portugal, Conversas de Burros, banhos de mar e outras crônicas exemplares (Cotovia, 2006). Além disso, o crítico inglês fala sobre os desafios do gênero, e especificamente sobre as crônicas de Machado de Assis.
Latin American Research Review, Dec 2013
Debates surrounding race in Brazil have become increasingly fraught in recent years as the once h... more Debates surrounding race in Brazil have become increasingly fraught in recent years as the once hegemonic concept of democracia racial continues to be subject to an ever more agnostic scrutiny. Parallel to these debates, and yet ultimately inseparable from them, is the question of what it is to be ‘white’. In this interdisciplinary paper, we argue that ‘whiteness’ has become increasingly sedimented in Brazilian public discourse as a naturalised category. And seeking a fresh perspective on what we perceive to have become a sterile debate, we examine Machado de Assis and his work to illustrate how assumptions surrounding his short story Pai contra Mãe and indeed comments on the author’s very body, reveal the extent to which ‘whiteness’ has come to be seen as non-negotiable and fixed. Placing a close reading of Machado’s text at the heart of the article, we explain our reading’s consequences for the scholarly debates now unfolding in Brazil as to the construction of ‘whiteness’. The article then develops ideas on ‘whiteness’ by pointing to the differences inherent between perspectives of ‘race’ as a process and perspectives of ‘race’ as a fixed and naturalized given.
Papers by Marcelo Mendes de Souza
Latin American Research Review, 2013
Resumo: Nessa comunicação, pretendo pesar a dissimetria entre a figura pública de Machado de Assi... more Resumo: Nessa comunicação, pretendo pesar a dissimetria entre a figura pública de Machado de Assis, partindo de sua reserva em participar do conjunto de entrevistas de João do Rio em O Momento Literário (em outras palavras, do registro de seu silêncio), e seu papel como escritor e crítico da sociedade da qual fazia parte, através da leitura classista de sua obra. Por um lado, Machado era (e por vezes ainda é) visto como um absenteísta, que nada pensava sobre, por exemplo, questões políticas, e que a ninguém se fazia ouvir. Por outro, há um conjunto de leituras que afirma, por seus escritos, que o autor de Dom Casmurro tinha muito que dizer sobre a sociedade da qual fazia parte - bem como tinha a intenção de fazê-lo, ainda que de forma dissimulada. Em outras palavras: Machado (assim como as posteriores concepções de sua vida e seu ideário) está do lado da escritura, não da fala. Nesse caso, script volant: a escrita, ao contrário da fala, é que liberta.
Anuário de Literatura, 2008
Resumo: Esse artigo pretende discutir o conceito de mímica de Homi K. Bhabha dentro de um context... more Resumo: Esse artigo pretende discutir o conceito de mímica de Homi K. Bhabha dentro de um contexto mais amplo, ulterior ao contexto dos estudos culturais e pós-coloniais, aproximando dele outros conceitos, tais como os estabelecidos por Gilles Deleuze em Diferença e repetição, entre outros textos, além de outros nomes, tais como Silviano Santiago, Jorge Luis Borges, Franz Kafka e Giorgio Agamben. Como uma espécie de conclusão prévia, ao final, o artigo confronta o conceito freudiano-marxista de Bhabha às Cinco proposições sobre a psicanálise, texto de Gilles Deleuze, de 1973 -desdobrando as discussões sobre psicanálise propostas em O Anti-Édipo, do mesmo autor.
In this paper, I focus on a very important point of comparison between Machado and Borges in term... more In this paper, I focus on a very important point of comparison between Machado and Borges in terms of communities of readers: the critical reception of Machado’s and Borges’ fictional works in the English-speaking world, particularly in North America.
Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges is often compared to Brazilian writer Machado de Assis in rela... more Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges is often compared to Brazilian writer Machado de Assis in relation to their ambivalent relations with their national and other literary traditions. In spite of evident differences between these two writers, each struggled against being characterized as a twentieth-century Argentine author or a nineteenth-century Brazilian writer. Both came to terms with their own literary traditions by looking at alternative narrative and cultural traditions, and by refusing to embrace the use ‘local colour’ and other common devices present in the literary productions of their peers. Furthermore, Machado and Borges are both characterised by critics as narrative and cultural ironists. Given their role as precursors of the new Latin American narrative, this article questions further what it means for each of them to be an ironist.
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Articles by Marcelo Mendes de Souza
Papers by Marcelo Mendes de Souza