BRAZIL
The
Making of a Novel
©2007
Errol Lincoln Uys
an
online literary archive
The
Outline |The Research
|The Journey |The
Writing
The
Research
My
library forays in New York over three months in 1981 provided the
background for my initial plotting and book proposal. With the outline
complete and broad themes of the novel well in mind, it was essential
to have firsthand experience of Portugal and Brazil. I couldn't
go back five hundred years, but I could make a sincere and honest
attempt to know the land and its people.
 I
was writing a novel not a history but was committed to offering
as authentic and historically accurate account as possible. In April
1981, I headed for Lisbon and three months later began my journey
in Brazil.
I
based myself outside Lisbon at Sintra, living in a quinta on a hillside
below Moorish battlements that overlooked Sintra Palace. I would
use this setting for the family seat of the first Cavalcantis to
go to Brazil:
Through his marriage to Inez Gonçalves, Cavalcanti's
father had come to possess lands on those serene vales before
the Serra de Sintra. Here between jagged rocks of antiquity
crowned with fallen battlement of Moor and the distant azure
expanse of the Atlantic, here was past and future, and whether
Nicolau climbed through the thick woods to the lee of the
old Infidel redoubt or stood on the windy headland at Cabo
da Roça,
he felt an intimacy with both.
I
divided my time between the Gulbenkian Foundation, British Institute
and Portuguese historic and geographic libraries and visits to sites
like Jeronimos Monastery, Belem Tower, Mafra, and traveling to Coimbra,
Belmont and Evora, all of which have a place in my novel. Besides
16th century Portugal, I was also interested in the mid-18th century
and events surrounding the Lisbon Earthquake of November 1755, one
of my Cavalcantis studying law in Portugal at the time.
Ten seconds later, there was a devastating shock. The houses
opposite Paulo began to sway; the floor beneath him vibrated
so violently that he struggled to keep his balance. Chimneys
crumbled, loose tiles fell to the ground, crockery in Dona Clara's
house shattered. Screams and the pitiful cries of animals rose.
But Paulo's perception of these noises was dulled by a thundering
in the earth. Terremoto! The word crashed through Paulo's
senses. “Earthquake!”
Paulo was mesmerized by the houses opposite, rocking on their
foundations, walls cracking and splitting, upper stories leaning
toward the street, chunks of masonry falling. Terror numbed
him. He stood frozen at the window, expecting death.
Three houses suddenly burst open and collapsed, burying the
family of four and the servant girls. The old man did not cease
his struggle to open his front door, even as the convulsions
rocked the street; he, too, was entombed by an avalanche of
masonry. Paulo looked beyond the opening opposite him: The city
was rising and falling in waves as if upon a storm-tossed sea;
landslides swept down the hillsides hurling houses toward the
lower ground; distant steeples and towers whipped about wildly;
clouds of dirt and dust hung in the air. The thunder of the
earth, the sound of breaking timbers, the rain of roof tiles
— the inconceivable noises came together in one deafening
roar of destruction.
Before
leaving Portugal for Brazil in July 1981, I prepared a list of objectives
sent in advance to potential contacts in Brazil's cultural and educational
ministries, historians and others whose names had been suggested
by sources I'd met in Portugal:
| Notes
on Research Project: Brazil —
July to October, 1981
My
novel is historical and a major part of my work can be accomplished
through a study of published sources. No matter how assiduously
this is undertaken, such bookwork cannot offer on location
observation with its inestimable value in bringing comprehension
and adding reality to your perspective. The following notes,
more or less in line with my envisaged chapter structure,
indicate the kind of material and experience I am seeking.
Creative
people are not supposed to be as formal as this, but with
so vast a project in mind I have to adopt some kind of organized
strategy for the research stage or I'll never put it all
together.
1.
Rain forest
I
want to describe, in detail, a single acre — "God's
Little Acre," in a way — before mankind's arrival.
I need to speak with experts at a forest
research station (outside Belém?),
who can explain, in simplest terms, the symbiosis of the
forest, its creation and the miraculous web of life that
ensures its survival. I need a geologist
to outline the creation of the Amazon basin
and the forces that shaped the sub-continent as we know
it today. A zoologist to
tell me about the animal life of the virgin forest. And
a sociologist who
can expound on "man and the forest," the forest's effect
on man over the centuries, both indigenous and immigrant.
(Charles Wagley, An Introduction to Brazil, has
some pertinent remarks on this theme.)
I'm
keen to keep the forest in perspective, but do see it as
an important link to a non-Brazilian's understanding of
the country. The perspective a Brazilian would like to see
should come to a reader of a book such as mine as the full
extent of Brazil's story unfolds. It will become clear that
the cliche image of jungle and river and little else is
erroneous.
2.
The Indians
I
am aware that visits to Indian groups are difficult to arrange
and my feeling is that while observation of an Amerindian
settlement would be valuable, I can sympathize with serious-minded
anthropologists having to contend with 'visitors'. Again,
there is a wealth of published material on Indian culture
and I'm capable of drawing my inspiration from this. However,
it would be valuable to talk with an
expert on the Tupinamba and Tupiniquin groups
in the vicinity of the littoral at the time of Cabral's
landfall. And to visit a worthwhile museum
or other institute that exhibits their artifacts
and depicts their lifestyle.
I
have well in mind a story built around the main group that
Cabral encounters and the gaps in my knowledge
are the kind that can be filled during some intensive sessions
with someone who knows the early history and has a sympathy
for the first inhabitants of Brazil. On Cabral's landfall,
I would like to visit Porto
Seguro and environs, possibly get out to
sea on a boat and imagine the rest for myself.
What
I also find of great value in trying to recapture these
early historical stages are collections of old prints, etchings
etc. That solitary, forgotten artist can often bring more
lucidity than a pile of text!
3.
The Portuguese
Seen
in the first quarter of the 16th century, this section has
been researched in Lisbon and emphasizes the Portuguese
empire in the East and early attempts at settling Brazil.
However,
it is here that I show the first of my two major fictional
families — the Cavalcantis in the captaincy of Duarte
Coelho in Pernambuco.
This
leads to one of my most crucial research projects: The Cavalcanti
sugar plantation,
(near Olinda?)
is seen throughout my book, from 1534 to the present, from
initial pioneer tract to "Big House" of the 18th century,
to usina,
and to independent plantation of the 1970's successfully
thwarting a multinational agribusiness takeover bid.
I
am interested in every aspect of such a plantation from
the simplest detail such as how sugar grows to the social
life and values of the plantation itself and its relationship
with the surrounding community. I'd look for details as
prosaic as the equipment in an 18th century kitchen, the
schooling of the owner's children, local festivals, customs
etc.
I
have, of course, read Gilberto Freyre's works, and anything
else I have been able to lay my hands on but this cannot
replace an opportunity of visiting a plantation and gaining
a real insight into its past and present.
4.
The Jesuits
It
will be essential for me to meet with Jesuit
historians to talk about the early history
of the Company in Brazil and get a clear picture of their
relations with the Indians and settlers. If anything remotely
like a reduction —
present day mission station?
— exists, I would like to visit it. But I am more
interested here in "matters of the soul;" I have a great
feeling for those early preachers engaged on so daunting
and lonely a mission in the New World and intend to devote
a chapter to them. I need to know what it was really like.
What manner of men, what motivation brought the courage
that led Nobrega and Anchieta to assume so formidable a
task?
I
would also like to have the settler
opinion from a qualified source: the reaction
to the fathers, the reductions etc. (For this and later
sections a visit to the Missiones
area, might be valuable.)
Since
I have always lived in a Protestant-orientated society,
I would welcome meetings with Catholic
churchmen on the importance of religious
values in a society such as Brazil, in its formative and
growth stages. I would like to comprehend the role and importance
of the priest in a small community by observing rather than
talking about it.
5.
The Bandeirantes
I'll
first deal with São
Paulo through the early Paulista settlement
and the Jesuit reduction; later, as home base for the bandeirantes.
Here, Bernardo da Silva's clan, the second major fictional
family of the book emerges and will be seen in conjunction
with the Cavalcantis from this point onwards. Besides the
bandeirante era (I concentrate on 1628-1681,) subsequent
chapters will see the da Silvas involved in the gold mines
to the north and, finally, in the days of the Empire, established
on a coffee fazenda. They later head up a large corporation
in São Paulo interested in, among other things, road
construction in Amazonia.
As
with the sugar plantation, I need to spend a brief but intensive
period on a classic coffee
fazenda.
On
my draft itinerary I have in mind a visit to the headwaters
of the
São Francisco/Doce rivers,
the area roamed over so many years by Fernao Dias Paes Leme,
on whom I lean strongly for characterization of my bandeirante
patriarch.
With
the bandeirantes, I specially want to get a picture of their
lifestyle that goes beyond the much-publicized bandeiras
— family life, day-to-day existence, community structure,
relationship with authority, 'peaceful' pursuits of work,
industry etc.
I'll
be writing about one of the greatest bandeiras of all, that
of Raposo Tavares from São Paulo to the Madeira
and Amazon. I obviously don't plan to follow
his exact route but will pick up glimpses of it through
travel and research for other sections of the book.
6.
The Planters
The
Cavalcanti sugar plantation is seen over four centuries
and requires detailed research. Here, too, I'm interested
in the slave market at Recife;
the arrival, sale and life of the slaves.
For
this section, I want to visit the backlands of the northeast,
the classic sertão.
I'll also need to have touched base with Ouro
Preto, and the mining era museums etc. Bahia
(Salvador) is seen briefly, with particular
reference to the Jesuits
and the Misericordia.
As
my research priorities indicate I am, in the main, staying
away from major cities. The localities I'm interested in
offer an attainable framework for a non-Brazilian writer:
to attempt anything in detail about the big cities is asking
for trouble. There will, of course, be brief forays toward
them as with Carnival
in Rio.
7.
Empire
The
da Silva fazenda looms large during this period - a fazenda
prosperous enough to have Emperor Dom Pedro II pay a visit
to it.
Two
major research areas here are the Paraguayan
War and the Abolition
of Slavery. As I stress throughout these
notes, while some of my time can be given over to interviews
I plan this as a field trip - It will be better for me to
visit some of the battle sites of the war with an enthusiastic
military historian than to examine uniforms, weapons of
the era in a museum.
8.
Foreigners and Fanatics
For
this section, I need to visit the site of Canudos.
I've read Euclides da Cunha several times, as well as other
references to this tragic episode but beyond the "facts,"
it is important for me to simply walk the ground upon which
Conselheiro and his people fought and died. Perhaps to seek
out backlands villages untouched by time that are reminiscent
of the era.
My
next interest lies in the Madeira-Mamoré
railroad. A brief visit to Manaus
could profitably be followed by a river
trip down to Porto Velho
and environs of the railroad project. Here,
too, I want to deal with Roosevelt's
'River of Doubt' expedition. Clearly, time
will not allow me much prospect of a close examination of
the terrain traversed. More important will be knowledge
of Colonel Rondon and
the Indian Protection Service.
9.
The Modern Era
Among
my interests are the USAF
base at Recife, Brasília,
the Trans-Amazonia highway
and a model private colonization scheme
such as Alta Floresta near
Aripuana. I want to get a proper understanding of developmental
challenges in the Northeast, both historical and contemporary,
and a contrasting view of the spectacular boom in São
Paulo and its environs.
I
have no preconceptions about how to approach the modern
section of this novel save an underlying sense of optimism
about Brazil and a willingness to listen and learn.
These
notes give an indication of my broad research requirements
on a field trip through Brazil.
Noticeably
absent is any reference to emotive and spiritual values
— the intangible "something" that will go toward an
understanding of Brazil as a nation and Brazilians as a
people. This can only come after many weeks of contact with
Brazilians, from the impressions they leave and the suggestions
they are more than likely to make to a stranger seeking
to find out what is Brazil.
|
Besides
these research objectives, I offered a glimpse of my story lines,
enough to grasp my plans for the book and more specific research
needs:
“While
I am aware that the role of the rain forest in Brazilian history
should not be over-emphasized, I want to open the book with a succinct
evocation of the lifecycle of an acre of virgin rain forest; its
creation and existence before the advent of mankind.
“The
first dwellers in the forest, the Indians, are seen in the period
1492-1500, eight years leading up to the arrival of Cabral's fleet.
Emphasis is placed on the Tupi-Guarani branch and, in particular,
a Tupinamba and a Tupiniquin group. While a novelistic technique
carries the story forward, I am equally concerned with a sympathetic
account of their lifestyle and its value-role in the formation of
Brazilian society.
“After
showing Cabral's landfall, my focus turns to the Portuguese trading
empire in the East, stressing Goa and Ormuz, in the period 1506
— 1516 to give the reader a concept of the men who first settled
Brazil and their heritage. With Cabral's fleet at Ormuz and Goa
and, later, in the Pernambuco captaincy of Duarte Coelho, the 'novel'
as opposed to the 'history' is advanced through the experience of
members of the Cavalcanti family, one of two major fictional families
who people my book. The first Brazilian episode is drawn against
a background of pioneer settlement, sugar plantation, settler-Indian
relations and Franco-Portuguese conflict along the coast.
“The
arrival at Bahia (Salvador) in 1549 of Padre Inácio Cavalcanti
in the company of Tomé de Sousa, first governor-general,
opens the next epoch in Brazilian history. I deal with this through
the Jesuit Cavalcanti, again, a fictional character though some
might say he was inspired by the life of Anchieta. I see Inácio
as a tragic visionary caught amid the conflicts that arise between
those who seek the soul of the Indian and those who want his body.
“The
historical setting for Inácio's story (1543 - 1586) encompasses
the early missionary-Indian contacts, the controversy over Indian
enslavement, the reductions. It also sees the advent of Bernardo
da Silva, patriarch of the second major fictional family. Silva
is a Paulista whose son, Amador, features as one of the great bandeirantes.
“This
chapter which spans sixty years will portray the saga of the Brazilian
pathfinders in much the same spirit as the trailblazing pioneers
of the American West. I find the records of these backlands conquerors
as stirring, if not more so, than their north American counterparts.
Nothing I've thus far read, which attempts to place their story
before the north American reader, does them justice. This, of course,
does not excuse their excesses in their raids on the reductions
but just as must be the case with other pioneering groups, there
is a constant need to examine the bandeirantes within the limits
of their own time and perspectives.
“The
latter chapter, too, touches on the Dutch occupation of the northeast
and the drawing together of various elements of the nascent Brazilian
nation in their resistance to the invaders.
“While
I appreciate that approaching the Brazilian story on a north-south
axis has been somewhat overdone, there seems justification for repeating
it this once more. Thus, I have the 'south', São Paulo, represented
in the story of the Silva family and the 'north' with the Cavalcantis.
Later sections of the book will bring into perspective the importance
of the western lands, in a more appropriate end timely frame.
“After
the formidable bandeirante saga, I want to follow a slower pace
through the next chapter with 'The Planters,' the story of the Cavalcanti
plantation and its people from 1720 - 1792. I am most concerned
here with the developing social values, the question of slavery,
the Pombal era, the stirrings of nationalism through the Tiradentes
episode. For much of this section, the Cavalcanti estate is ably
run by the widow, Dona Domitila Cavalcanti, an unusual figure in
those days but one which will afford a special insight into the
role of women in 18th century Brazil.
“I
see value in using such contrasting personalities for underlining
certain points, just as it is the Cavalcanti plantation priest,
Father Viana, who reaches toward an understanding of the problems
of over speculative agriculture.
“As
the story of Brazil unfolds, my next chapter, spanning 1864 - 1889,
moves to the prospering coffee fazenda of the Silva family near
São Paulo. It rests on two major events: War of the Triple
Alliance and the Abolition of Slavery. Both are seen against the
backdrop of Brazil as an independent empire, with Dom Pedro II featuring
throughout.
“Moving
toward the present century, I tell the story of Vicente Cavalcanti,
who is closely involved with three historical figures: Conselheiro,
Rondon and Roosevelt. Shifting from the sertão the Amazon
area, Vicente's saga covers Canudos, the Madeira-Mamoré railroad's
construction, with asides on the rubber boom and the Rondon-Roosevelt
'River of Doubt' expedition by which time Vicente is a member of
the Indian Protection Service.
“The
period 1945-1975 will see the Cavalcanti-Silva families united in
marriage and fortune, through incidents that unfolded during the
days of the Empire. Major events to be used for this section include
Brazil's little-known but important contribution to World War II
with emphasis on the U.S. base at Recife; the fears of insurrection
in the North-East in later decades, Brasília's birth, the
development of the Trans-Amazonia highway. Through this section
I intend to show the unity and diversity of Brazil, the tremendous
challenges facing the second largest nation in the Western hemisphere,
the search to define its relationship with the United States, the
fears and hopes of its people.
“Conclusions,
of course, can only lie at the end of a great deal of work and research
and thought, but I envisage a final chapter of hope and celebration,
written around the Rio Carnival and a model colonization scheme
in the Amazon area.”
These
gleanings from my outline and in-depth reading and research were
intended to convince those whose help I sought that I was involved
in a serious project of which I already had more than a working
grasp. A breathtaking and formidable task but which, after my two
years with Michener on The Covenant, I had every confidence
of accomplishing.
I
prepared a draft itinerary that would allow me to touch base with
all the important locations in the novel, an itinerary clearly open
to revision as priorities demanded.
Draft
itinerary for visit to Brazil: July to October 1981
July
2
Arrive Recife from Lisbon
July
3 - 7
Recife/Olinda
July
8 - 12
Recife/Olinda area - "sugar plantation"
July
13 - 14 To
Canudos - Pernambuco 'backlands' en route
July
15 - 16
Canudos
July
17 - 18
Salqueiro - Belém (surface)
July
19 - 21
Belém (Amazon forest research station etc.)
July
22
Belém - Manaus (air)
July
23 - 26 Manaus
July
27 - 29 Manaus
- Porto Velho (Madeira River?)
July
20 - Aug 8 Porto Velho
- Madeira-Mamore railroad/
Aripuana to Alta Floresta/
environs of Rio
Roosevelt etc.
Aug
9
Porto Velho - Brasilia (air)
Aug
10 - Aug 15 Brasília
Aug
16 - Aug 22 Brasília
- Salvador via Sáo
Francisco area
Aug
23 - Aug 29 Salvador
Aug
30
To Porto Seguro
Aug
31 - Sept l Porto Seguro
- Ouro Preto
Sept
2 - 3
Ouro Preto
Sept
4 - 10
Rio de Janeiro (lst visit)
Sept
11 - 15
São Paulo
Sept
16 - 24
São Paulo ( on coffee fazenda)
Sept
21
São Paulo to Asuncion (air)
Sept
22 - 24
Asuncion, Paraguay
Sept
25 - Oct 3 Asuncion
- Humaíta to Missiones area etc.
Oct
3 - Oct 17 Rio de
Janeiro for consultations with local
Historians/contacts
Oct
18
Return to New York. |
I
was to begin my trip at Salvador, the Mother City, the best possible
start to a journey in search of the “real Brazil,” as
people in the south refer to Bahia. From Salvador I went to Porto
Seguro and Cabrália, walking along the beaches and broad
bluffs that are the setting for the opening of my book along the
same beach where I saw the young Tupiniquin, Aruanã, at the
water's edge on a day in 1500.
Tiny puffs of cloud had fallen to the end of
the earth. Four... five...six were bunched together just above
the horizon, and others were coming to join them. Otherwise
the sky was perfectly clear, its blue expanse streaked with
the blazing color of the lowering sun.
He made a hesitant progress toward the water, squinting
into the distance at the strange clouds. But even as he did
so and perplexed as he was, he began to see that his first impression
had been wrong. Very quickly now the swiftest clouds lifted
above the water and he saw a darker line. There was a flash
of understanding: Here were great canoes coming from the end
of the earth.
Aruanã watched as they came closer. The
sun was gone behind the trees, and he found it difficult to
discern the craft, but he stood rooted a while longer before
he realized that he must hasten to the village and tell what
he had seen. This made him gaze at the horizon again, to be
absolutely certain, for it was a fantastic discovery for a man
who had gone to seek no more than shells for First Child. They
were there, darkening images now, these canoes that had come
from the end of the earth.
From
Porto Seguro to Brasília, a tremendous leap in time and imagination
that was to prove fateful. Though I did not know it then, I was being
handed one of the keys to my vision of Brazil, the metaphor of Brasília
and E1 Dorado. In his review of Brazil , the eminent Brazilian
literary scholar, Professor Wilson Martins wrote:
What
we have in front of us is the Brazilian national epic in all
its decisive episodes — the indigenous civilization
and the El Dorado myth that they themselves created and supported,
passing it on to the hallucinated imaginations of the conqueror;
the discovery and domination of the North-East; the Bandeiras
and geographical expansion; the gold rush and nationalist feeling
present, not only in the struggle against the Dutch but also
the Inconfidência Mineira; the Royal Family's arrival
and the Independence; the Second Reign and the war with Paraguay;
the Abolition and the Republic — everything converging
like the segments of a rose window in that reborn and metamorphosized
myth that is Brasília, symbol of the proclaimed territorial
integrity and, not without reason, with the expeditions that
expanded to the south and to the west on the pretext of capturing
Indians and searching for the “Golden Fleece.”
From
Brasília, I traveled to Piauí and the sertão
of Bahia, to Uauá and Canudos. Like so many other stops along
my journey, I was there to brood over the past. I already had the
broad picture but needed the innumerable small details to fill my
canvas. To have studied Euclides da Cunha's Rebellion in the Backlands
and other sources was one thing, but go alone into the thorny
caatingas, walk for hours with the sun burning down on you,
rest upon that stony earth, not a little fearful that you're totally
lost — it takes little to imagine the hell of Antonio Conselheiro's
New Jerusalem. (Picture
shows site of Canudos, as it appeared after diversion of a river,
locals believing it was intentionally flooded by government.)
My
next halt was at Recife and Olinda where I spent three weeks, mostly
under the guidance of Gilberto Freyre's Joaquim Nabuco Foundation.
With their help I found my valley of Santo Tomás and my imaginary
town of Rosário, the locales for my fictitious family of Cavalcantis.
From
Recife I traveled to Belém and embarked upon the Amazon, five
days of brooding along the river sea to Manaus and on to Porto Velho.
What I had in mind in journeying the wilderness was not so much Nature's
glories but the men who were first to venture there: the bandeirantes.
Nowhere but in those lonely tracts of forest could I get a sense of
the enormity of their undertakings, their indefatigable spirit and
courage.
From
Porto Velho and Cuiabá, I headed south to Rio, São Paulo
and Minas Gerais. After so many weeks it was a shock, traveling out
of the backlands to the great cities. I was as bewildered and lonely
as the sertanejo who goes south, but even as I felt this
I knew my intuition to start my journey in the north had been right.
Had I plunged into Rio or São Paulo at the start, I could've
been drowned but up north I was able to absorb the Brazilian "thing"
in small doses, day by day.
This
is a very real problem in developing a book like mine, for in so short
a time no outsider can possibly hope to get more than a superficial
look at a great city like Rio de Janeiro. Which is why when I got
down to writing Brazil I placed my two families beyond the
cities, the Cavalcantis on Engenho Santo Tomás near
Rosário and the da Silvas of bandeirante ancestry at the fictional
Itatinga on the Rio Tietê, their worlds a microcosm of the greater
Brazil beyond.
More
than the land, the Brazilian people themselves gave me the thousand
and one insights I needed. Try to imagine a stranger coming to you
and telling you he is going to write a novel about the entire history
of Brazil. Five hundred years! A crackpot! Louco! Bemused
some were but with one solitary exception, a fiery young man of Manaus
who flew into a rage and said an estrangeiro had no right
to "steal Brazil's past,” save for this lone objector, I'd unstinting
help and support from hundreds of people, some giving me days of their
time, some only precious moments. An unnamed peasant woman standing
next to me in a bus queue in Brasília and asking that I buy
an orange for her sick child: I realized later that the orange was
all the pair had for nourishment on a twenty-six hour bus trip.
I
kept my daily journal during my trip and filled twenty notebooks.
I pored over dozens of maps, paintings, photographs, absorbing and
interpreting this mass of information as I went along. I was not bound
by the same constraints as the historian, my book is a work of the
imagination, but I was under an obligation to get the facts right.
Foremost was an overriding desire to write a book that was accurate,
balanced and avoided stereotypical images and over-simplifications
that often mar the works of outsiders attempting popular fiction about
Latin America.
Where
my interpretations revise commonly-held views, I arrived at my conclusions
only after the most critical thought. My view of Brazilian slavery,
for example, particularly the early centuries is harsher than what
was usually portrayed. I did not study Brazilian slavery in isolation
but looked at the Portuguese record in Mozambique and Angola, particularly
the degradation of the Congo; the more I thought about it, the less
I believed that the harsh Portuguese slaver in Africa could miraculously
be transformed into a paragon in Santa Cruz. Palmares was the quilombo
that made "headlines,” but how many others were there?
Tens of thousands of runaway slaves do not suggest a benign regime
of bondage.
I
asked myself time and again, and not only with slavery: through whose
eyes was the past beheld? Almost never in a colonial situation does
one find anything but the official story neatly penned for bureaucrats
thousands of miles away.
I'm
no “frock coat” devoted to the literary salon. I do not
write staring above the heads of the mass of people. I like to get
my hands dirty “to recreate history,” as one reviewer
of Brasil said, “almost entirely at ground level.”
While generations of fictitious Cavalcantis and Silvas populate my
landscape, I took great pains to bring to center stage a host of characters
drawn from the masses. Affonso Ribeiro and his wild clan; Nhungaza
of Palmares and his grandson, Black Peter; Antonio Paciência,
the mulatto, slave, voluntário in the Paraguayan War,
so-called "fanatic" at Canudos, above all, “Antonio Paciencia-Brasileiro!”
A few of the many as dear and vital to me as the great men of the
earth in Brazil, past and present.
| I
could not have accomplished Brazil without the
help of numerous Brazilians on my long journey, including
José Honôrio Rodrigues; Gilberto Freyre; Fernando
Freyre; Antonio Fantinanto Neto; Max Justo Guedes; Eduardo
Matarazzo Suplicy; Luiz Hafers; Edson Nery da Fonseca; Aluysio
Magalhães: Vladimir Murtinho; Roberto Motta; Oswaldo
Lima Filho; José Antonio Gonçalves de Mello;
Fernando Antonio Novaes; Carlos Rizzini; Anna Amelia Viêra
Nascimento; Antonietta de Aguiar Nunes; Amalia Correa; Christina
Mattos; Eduardo Borcacov. Plus countless Brazilians I met
along the way, like “Black Jimi” Carvalho, who
showed me a tough side of Recife I would never have seen
without his guidance.
It
was sheer luck that the day after landing at Salvador, Bahia,
I met Professor Antonietta de Aguiar Nunes, a brilliant
and passionate student of Brazilian life and history. A
scheduled appointment with another source at the Salvador
tourist office was cancelled and Professor Nunes introduced
to me instead. Over the four months I was in Antonietta's
country, she offered me every assistance in sharing her
contacts in different cities, exhaustively debating issues
both topical and historic, foreshadowing my visits to locales
I was researching with advance notes on where I should go
and what I should see. Antonietta's letters were sent to
me post restante along my route, a precarious business
at best but often her invaluable guides were waiting for
me in the far corners of Brazil. A few examples:
July
12, Porto Seguro: “Porto Seguro is a city of two levels.
To see Monte Pascoal, climb the tower of the Church of Nossa
Senhora de Pena (patron saint of Porto Seguro) in the upper
town. Here, too, are the Casa da Camara e Cadeia; the ancient
Colegio dos Jesuitas and Church of São Benedito.
People say there was a tunnel from the Jesuit church to
a farm called Fazenda do Tanque.
Brazil
was discovered at baia Cabrália — there's a
controversy, people from Porto Seguro insist it was there,
but it's now proved that it was at baia Cabrália.
Coroa Vermelha island, where the first mass was celebrated,
divides the region: from the north we have the calm bay
of Cabrália and from the south, the Boqueirão
of the French. The French invaded Santa Cruz in the second
half of the XVII century.”
11
August, Recife: “It was interesting reading about
the contact you had with Black Jimi. We can discuss the
term 'abandonados' that you use in a wider sense than we
do in Brasil. It's not true at all that we don't have race
prejudice. How many generals, admirals, even bishops in
Brasil are black? Or even mulatto? Bishops? Perhaps a few
but generals and admirals, none. Our 'apartheid' is disguised.
The problem however seems to me to be more of social prejudice
than a racial one.”
29
August, Cuiabá,: “Gilberto Freyre's Luso-Tropicalism,
or better, Hispano-Tropicalism, seems to me to be the wiser
way to 'conquer' any land. You have to adapt yourself not
only to the land and the climate but also to the culture
of the people who live there. All Bahianos of the Reconcavo
region, no matter the color of their skin, are half-white
and half-black, half Catholic and half 'candomblezeiro.'
Homo Brasilienensis truly exists, as you will find traveling
thousands of kilometers around our big country. We are not
Europeans, we are not only Americans, we are all of this,
and also Africans in a lot of things, more in some aspects
than in others.
Talking
about relations between man and the land, I don't think
you can compare Brasil to Siberia; the dimensions are big
but we have no uniformity at all: Amazon region is one thing,
the caatingas of the North-East and the cerrado
of central Brasil are quite different, and so the littoral
with the zona da mata and massapé,
so good for agriculture! And the southern regions, another
different reality - Our unity was historically a fruit of
political expediency.
It
seems to me that the main key to understand Brasil is to
admit its variety, not the homogeneity that does not exist.
It looks to me like the Portuguese furniture called contador:
a big cabinet with many compartments, all joined together
as one piece, but each with its own key."
Ouro
Preto, October 2: "Now you're at the center of Brasil in
the 18th century! The old way to reach Minas Gerais came
from São Paulo following the River Paraiba, the Dutra
road nowadays, and then across the mountain range of Mantiqueira.
Afterwards the Caminho Novo connected the mining region
with the Port of Rio de Janeiro. These routes were heavily
guarded to avoid the theft of gold. Because of the mountains,
the small cities were isolated and adopted a regional barroco
style in the construction of their churches. You can see
the most important works of Aleijadinho at the Church of
São Francisco de Assis in Ouro Preto."
Salvador,
October 8: "I find it excellent that your northern family
will be the most important. As you have seen Bahia and the
North-North-East is considered by everybody as more representative
of Brasil than the south. What exists here really characterizes
Brasil, setting it apart from other countries.
Fernando's
quizzical remark about 'who are the Brazilians?' is something
that could only be made by a Paulista. In any other region
of Brasil, we would know who we are. However, I find your
attempts to answer this very reasonable, and also the observation
that the immigrants' strong influence 'slowed down the process
of integrating a Brazilian identity.' I think it is a very
good idea to have the da Silva group influenced by the immigrant
wave and exhibiting its lifestyle, opinions etc. This will
make a non-Brasilian understand better the contrast between
São Paulo and the rest of the country.
Your
northern family could be a Coelho, a Cavalcanti, an Albuquerque,
there are several other old Christian names and of real
Portuguese noble origin. And, of course, you can keep your
friends, Nicolau, Vicente, Inácio!”
|
Top
of Page
To
The Journey I
|
