Posts featuring Lima Barreto

Skin Has Two Sides: Bruna Dantas Lobato on Translating Jeferson Tenório

. . . racism and colorism affect all of us . . . there’s no interpersonal relationship that isn’t shaped by it.

In 2023, Bruna Dantas Lobato won a PEN Translates grant for her work on Jeferson Tenório’s The Dark Side of Skin, a moving, feeling novel of how relationships—between parent and child, between lovers, between a body and a city—change, develop, and intwine against powerful institutions and worldly violences. Through the story of Pedro—which is in turn told through the life of his murdered father—Tenório vividly inscribes the urbanity of Porto Alegre and the generations that move through it, along with the cruelty, the mystery, and the love. In this interview, Lobato speaks on the novel’s treatment of racism, its refractions of Baldwin, and how its author draws on Brazil’s rich aesthetic canon.

Xiao Yue Shan (XYS): You’ve spoken before about how passionate you are about translating titles from the northeast of Brazil, but The Dark Side of Skin takes place in in southern Brazil—Porto Alegre—and Tenório has spoken about how the racism it describes is one that is expressed more pointedly in regards to the city’s relatively homogenous population. Could you speak a little bit about how geography or regionality works in this novel, and also about what drew you to translate it?

Bruna Dantas Lobato (BDL): The Northeast of Brazil, where I grew up, is very underrepresented in literature both in Brazil and abroad. There are very few authors from that region available in translation, especially compared to the whiter metropoles. I’d love to see a greater range of stories from different parts of Brazil in English, so we don’t keep reading the same versions of Latin America over and over again. 

I was drawn to Tenório’s novel for similar reasons, for how it presents the experience of a Black man in a predominantly white city with insight and tenderness. It’s a beautiful and painful book, and to have Tenório join the slate of Porto Alegre authors widely available in English with a different kind of book was important to me. I hope the publishers who often tell me that they already have their one Brazilian author—or one author from a certain region—will see that one voice can’t possibly represent a whole country.

XYS: A significant portion of the novel is written in the second person, which is a literary point-of-view that I think is especially sensitive to each individual language and the culture it stems from (e.g. in terms of interpersonal hierarchies, categories of persons, speech-acts). How was it working with the second person here?

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Weekly Dispatches from the Frontlines of World Literature

Your news from the literary world, all in one place.

This week, our Editors-at-Large bring us up to speed on literary happenings in South Africa, Central America, and Brazil.

Alice Inggs, Editor-at-Large, South Africa: 

South Africa has eleven official languages, a fact not often evident in local literary awards and publications, which generally skew towards English and Afrikaans as mediums. However, the announcement of the 2017 South African Literary Awards (SALA) has done much to change this perception.

In addition to including five contributors to narratives in the extinct !Xam and !Kun languages (drawn from the Wilhelm Bleek and Lucy Lloyd archives), a biography in Sepedi (Tšhutšhumakgala by Moses Shimo Seletisha) and poetry collections in isiXhosa (Iingcango Zentliziyo by Simphiwe Ali Nolutshungu) and the Kaaps dialect (Hammie by Ronelda S. Kamfer) have been shortlisted.

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Reevaluating the Urgent Political Relevance of 20th Century Brazilian Novelist Lima Barreto

"He’s the author who picks a fight with the republic, demanding more res publica."

Authors forgotten in their lifetimes sometimes resurface decades later, telling us stories that resonate far beyond their original historical moment. One such writer is Lima Barreto, whose poignant renderings of working class Brazilians from the turn of the twentieth century reverberate with contemporary relevance. Today, anthropologist Lilia Moritz Schwarcz tells Asymptote about her experience researching and writing the new biography of Lima Barreto, Lima Barreto, Triste Visionário, released in Brazil in July 2017.


Lara Norgaard (LN): In the biography you recently published, Lima Barreto, Triste Visionário, you read Lima Barreto’s fiction through the lens of history and anthropology. How was the experience of studying literature from that perspective? Why is historical context important for reading Lima’s work?

Lilia Moritz Schwarcz (LMS): Disciplinary contact zones are engaging spaces, but they are contested. I place myself at the intersection of anthropology, history, and literary criticism. It was a great concern of mine not to see literature as a direct reflection of reality, since we know that Lima Barreto, while reflecting on reality, also created his own. At the same time, Lima said he wrote literaturamilitante, a term he himself used. That kind of committed literature dialogues with reality.

Lima even suffered for that approach in his time. What we now praise as high literature used to be considered unimaginative. Can you believe that? His contemporaries said that because he referenced reality and his own life, he didn’t have imagination. For me, that was a big step. I thought, I’m going to write this life by engaging with the reality that Lima lived, just as he himself did. Take his first novel, Recordações do EscrivãoIsaias Caminha, which is the story of a young black man, the son of a former slave who takes the train to the big city, as Lima did. In that city he experiences discrimination. And the second part of the book is entirely a roman à clef, as it calls attention to journalism as the fourth estate. The novel was so critical that the media blacklisted Lima, and the book was terribly received. His story “Numa e a Ninfa” critiqued politicians and his second novel, The Sad End of Policarpo Quaresma, critiqued president Floriano Peixoto. Peixoto is part of the book. History enters the novel. And in that sense these novels dialogue with reality and invite the historian.

I also read the excellent North American biographer of Dostoevsky, Joseph Frank, who calls attention to how it’s possible for novels to structure a biography, not the other way around. So I tried to include Lima Barreto’s voice in my book. He’s the writer, and rather than explain something in his place it would be better to let him say it. And so, looking at the biography, you’ll find that I often intersperse my voice with Lima’s. Those were the methods I used working in the contact zones between disciplines.

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Meet the Curator: Joselia Aguiar on Charting the Path To the Peripheries of Literature

The curator of a venerated literary festival in Brazil on innovation, diversity, and the role of the overlooked minority in art and literature.

Flip is a literary fiesta celebrating art and the written word in Brazil. The festival takes over the streets, squares and buildings of the colonial town of Paraty in Rio de Janeiro from July 26 to 30 every year, and calls itself a “feast.” Since its inception in 2003, Flip has garnered accolades in Brazil’s literary circles while also being controversial for favoring mainstream intelligentsia and largely leaving out minorities. The festival’s name stands for Festa Literária Internacional de Paraty (Paraty International Literary Festival). 

The curator for the 2017 edition of Flip is journalist and academic Joselia Aguiar. Over the last twelve years, Aguiar’s work has focused on literature, the editorial market, and public policies for reading. She has served in the capacities of an editor, columnist, academic and workshop leader. Aguiar is also writing a biography of the Brazilian modernist writer Jorge Amado (1912—2001), focusing on the literary and political exchange between Amado and writers of Hispanic America.

Every year, Flip pays homage to a Brazilian literary figure. This year’s honoree, chosen by Aguiar, is Lima Barreto, the Afro-Brazilian writer and journalist, best known for his novella, The Sad End of Policarpo Quaresma. Aguiar spoke about curating the festival with journalist and poet Jeanne Callegari in an exclusive interview for Asymptote.

—Maíra Mendes Galvão, Asymptote Editor-at-Large, Brazil.

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Weekly Dispatches from the Frontlines of World Literature

No matter where you are, we've got you covered.

Since 2013 we’ve been bringing you the latest news in the literary world, and we’re not about to stop anytime soon! This week our Executive Assistant, Cassie Lawrence, showcases the latest exciting books being published and prizes being awarded in the UK; our new Editor-at-Large from Brazil, Lara Norgaard, focuses on racial and gender diversity in festivals across the country, as well as newly published work that had been previously lost; finally, our Editor-at-Large for Taiwan, Vivian Szu-Chin Chih, fills us in on the latest prizes as well as film festivals happening right now! 

Cassie Lawrence, Executive Assistant at Asymptote, reports from the UK: 

An unpublished manuscript from the late author Maurice Sendak (known for Where the Wild Things Are) has been discovered. The manuscript is complete with illustrations and is said to date from twenty years ago, according to Publishers Weekly. A publisher for the new title has not yet been announced.

June 20-23 saw twenty British writers and over fifty literature professionals from around the world gather in Norwich as part of the International Literature Showcase. An online platform that allows the showcasing and collaboration of international literature organisations, the live event included panel discussions and readings from Elif Shafak, Graeme Macrae Burnet, David Szalay, and more.

Good news for libraries finally! Following the cuts that have taken place across the country in recent years, The Bookseller brings news that 14 libraries across Lancashire are set to reopen later this year and early next year. These will be partly run by community groups, but with the majority still being run by the council.
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Weekly Dispatches from the Frontlines of World Literature

Your latest updates from Brazil, Iran, and the UK

This week, Brazilian Editor-at-Large Maíra Mendes Galvão reports from Brazil’s vibrant literary scene. Poupeh Missaghi writes about how Iranians celebrated a revered literary figure’s birthday and gives us a peep into the preparations for the Tehran International Book Fair. And M. René Bradshaw has much to report from London’s literati! Hope you’re ready for an adventure! 

Maíra Mendes Galvão, our Editor-at-Large for Brazil, brings us the latest from literary events:

The capital of the Brazilian state of Ceará, Fortaleza, hosted the 12th Biennial Book Fair last weekend. The very extensive and diverse program included the presence of Conceição Evaristo, Ricardo Aleixo, Marina Colasanti, Joca Reiners Terron, Eliane Brum, Luiz Ruffato, Natércia Pontes, Daniel Munduruku, Frei Betto and many others. The event also paid homage to popular culture exponents such as troubadour Geraldo Amâncio, musician Bule Bule, and poet Leandro Gomes de Barros. One of the staples of Ceará is “literatura de cordel“, a literary genre (or form) that gets its name from the way the works (printed as small chapbooks) have traditionally been displayed for sale: hanging from a sort of clothesline (cordel). It was popularized by a slew of artists, including a collective of women cordel writers, Rede Mnemosine de Cordelistas, who marked their presence in a field originally dominated by men.

The northeast of Brazil is bubbling with literary activities: this week, from April 26-28, the city of Ilhéus, in the state of Bahia, hosts its own literary festival, FLIOS. There will be talks and debate about local literature and education as well as a book fair, workshops, book launches, performances, and readings.

The other upcoming literary festival is Flipoços, hosted by the city of Poços de Caldas in the south eastern state of Minas Gerais. Milton Hatoum, celebrated writer from the state of Amazonas, will be the patron of this edition of the festival, which will also pay homage to the literature of Mozambique. Guests include Rafael Gallo, Roberta Estrela D’Alva, Tati Bernardi, Ungulani Ba Ka Khosa, and others.

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Weekly Dispatches from the Frontlines of World Literature

Updates from Brazil, Argentina, Germany, and Austria

Would you believe we have already reached the end of January? We’ve already brought you reports from eleven different nations so far this year, but we’re thrilled to share more literary news from South America and central Europe this week. Our Editor-at-Large for Argentina, Sarah Moses, brings us news of literary greats’ passing, while her new colleague Maíra Mendes Galvão covers a number of exciting events in Brazil. Finally, a University College London student, Flora Brandl, has the latest from German and Austrian.

Asymptote’s Argentina Editor-at-Large, Sarah Moses, writes about the death of two remarkable authors:

The end of 2016 was marked by the loss of Argentinian writer Alberto Laiseca, who passed away in Buenos Aires on December 22 at the age of seventy-five. The author of more than twenty books across genres, Laiseca is perhaps best known for his novel Los Sorias (Simurg, 1st edition, 1998), which is regarded as one of the masterworks of Argentinian literature.

Laiseca also appeared on television programs and in films such as El artista (2008). For many years, he led writing workshops in Buenos Aires, and a long list of contemporary Argentinian writers honed their craft with him.

Some two weeks after Laiseca’s passing, on January 6, the global literary community lost another great with the death of Ricardo Piglia, also aged seventy-five. Piglia was a literary critic and the author of numerous short stories and novels, including Respiración artificial (Pomaire, 1st edition, 1980), which was published in translation in 1994 by Duke University Press.

The first installments of Piglia’s personal diaries, Los diarios de Emilio Renzi, were recently released by Anagrama and are the subject of the film 327 cuadernos, by Argentinian filmmaker Andrés Di Tella. The film was shown on January 26 as part of the Museo Casa de Ricardo Rojas’s summer series “La literatura en el cine: los autores,” which features five films on contemporary authors and poets, including Witold Gombrowicz and Alejandra Pizarnik.

On January 11, the U.S. press New Directions organized an event at the bookstore Eterna Cadencia in anticipation of the February release of A Simple Story: The Last Malambo by Argentinian journalist Leila Guerriero and translated by Frances Riddle. Guerriero discussed the book, which follows a malambo dancer as he trains for Argentina’s national competition, as well as her translation of works of non-fiction with fellow journalist and author Mariana Enriquez. Enriquez’s short story collection, Things We Lost in the Fire (Hogarth), translated by Megan McDowell, will also appear in English in February.

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