I have readChico Buarque, Essa gente (2019)
Ana Paula Maia, De gados e homens (2013) Jô Soares, O Xangô de Baker Street (1995) Paulo Coelho, O Alquimista (1988), Onze minutos (2003) Lygia Fagundes Telles, Ciranda de pedra (1954) Jorge Amado, São Jorge dos Ilhéus (1944), Gabriela cravo e canela (1958) Machado de Assis, Dom Casmurro (1899) Aluísio Azevedo, O Cortiço (1890) |
Vertical Divider
|
I have writtenChapters on Brazilian literature in Historia literatur iberoamerykańskich
|
a book of initiation
Brazilian literature is one of simple stories, of simple people. It lacks excessive sophistication, bringing about freshness and directness of human experience. Paulo Coelho is particularly reputed as such an unsophisticated, popular writer; a professor like me should be almost ashamed of reading such things.
Nonetheless, I consider Onze minutos as a high literary achievement; what is more, one that could be born only in Brazil. Contrary to what one might imagine, it is extremely difficult to write an erotic novel without stepping out of boundaries of the good taste, and also of the respect for humanness. Coelho managed it precisely for those typically Brazilian qualities of freshness and directness. There is certainly a particular openness toward the body in Brazilian culture; he works with it. And perhaps to strengthen the dimension of respect, he transports this uninhabited Brazilian eroticism to the most improbable location: Geneva. He counts the story of a young woman, Maria, engaged by a Suisse impresario as a samba dancer for a night club, who ends up making a quiet and orderly life as a prostitute. In parallel to her professional life, she develops her private quest for love, and for orgasm, since the female sexual fulfilment is not immediate; it requires a long search, a long initiation. And finally she meets the right client, a painter, with whom everything becomes possible.
The novel is like a beautiful dream, a constant progress, very much in the line of the Alquimista. Maria lives her life step by step, always in search of her dream, when she works in the shop, when she decides to spend her saving on a trip to Rio de Janeiro, when she meets the impresario and accepts the job in Geneva. Her intimate search is documented on the interspersed pages of her journal, just to show she is the one who speaks, not the one who is spoken of; she is the one who searches, not the one who drifts away on the floats of time. And she arrives at every target, love, orgasm, marriage and family, even money and comfort, because she will live in a beautiful house with her husband and his two daughters.
In the background, it is easy to feel a good knowledge of all the classical erotic or even pornographic literature; I have no doubts that Coelho must have read it carefully. He is aware of that tradition of "female education", that in many, or most, textual instances implies whipping, some forms of enforcement, etc. He also has this in his book, at a given moment, but he is able to go beyond, deeper. Quite close, as it is my private persuasion, to the actual mystery of female fulfilment.
Paulo Coelho, Onze minutos, Rio de Janeiro, Editora Rocco, 2003.
Neuville-sur-Oise, November 2020.
Nonetheless, I consider Onze minutos as a high literary achievement; what is more, one that could be born only in Brazil. Contrary to what one might imagine, it is extremely difficult to write an erotic novel without stepping out of boundaries of the good taste, and also of the respect for humanness. Coelho managed it precisely for those typically Brazilian qualities of freshness and directness. There is certainly a particular openness toward the body in Brazilian culture; he works with it. And perhaps to strengthen the dimension of respect, he transports this uninhabited Brazilian eroticism to the most improbable location: Geneva. He counts the story of a young woman, Maria, engaged by a Suisse impresario as a samba dancer for a night club, who ends up making a quiet and orderly life as a prostitute. In parallel to her professional life, she develops her private quest for love, and for orgasm, since the female sexual fulfilment is not immediate; it requires a long search, a long initiation. And finally she meets the right client, a painter, with whom everything becomes possible.
The novel is like a beautiful dream, a constant progress, very much in the line of the Alquimista. Maria lives her life step by step, always in search of her dream, when she works in the shop, when she decides to spend her saving on a trip to Rio de Janeiro, when she meets the impresario and accepts the job in Geneva. Her intimate search is documented on the interspersed pages of her journal, just to show she is the one who speaks, not the one who is spoken of; she is the one who searches, not the one who drifts away on the floats of time. And she arrives at every target, love, orgasm, marriage and family, even money and comfort, because she will live in a beautiful house with her husband and his two daughters.
In the background, it is easy to feel a good knowledge of all the classical erotic or even pornographic literature; I have no doubts that Coelho must have read it carefully. He is aware of that tradition of "female education", that in many, or most, textual instances implies whipping, some forms of enforcement, etc. He also has this in his book, at a given moment, but he is able to go beyond, deeper. Quite close, as it is my private persuasion, to the actual mystery of female fulfilment.
Paulo Coelho, Onze minutos, Rio de Janeiro, Editora Rocco, 2003.
Neuville-sur-Oise, November 2020.
