Utopias of Otherness: Nationhood and Subjectivity in Portugal and Brazil

Departing from the premise that Portugal and Brazil have exerted and continue to exert a significant influence on each other's sense of identity, Utopias of Otherness explores the representation of nationhood in contemporary Portuguese and Brazilian literatures and focuses on the utopias that have guided the national imaginaries of both countries in light of centuries of Luso-Brazilian relations and reciprocal cultural interpretations. Arenas traces the weakening of utopian thought from macrovisions of nationhood to smaller expressions of a better world as interpreted by a hybrid group of Brazilian and Portuguese writers and critics. Despite their differences, the authors chosen for this study have each centered part of their work on topics such as nationhood, postcolonialism, utopias and gender, and thus form a coherent corpus through which to explore this Portuguese-Brazilian critical dialogue that had been lacking thus far in English academic circles.

The core of the book is divided into five main chapters that, other than chapter 5, are each mostly dedicated to either Portugal or Brazil and representative writers from these countries; yet, when appropriate, references are made to the other country and its literature to shed light on significant intercultural connections. Arenas begins his study by a historical survey of Portugal and Brazil, tracing the history of ideas that have defined these countries and their changing definitions of nationhood. Chapter 1 situates Portuguese nationhood within the epistemological shifts that have taken place since the Portuguese Revolution of 1974. Of particular interest to the subsequent chapters is the section entitled "National Identity in the Portuguese Intellectual Field" that draws on the writings of key contemporary critics such as Eduardo Lourenço, Boaventura de Sousa Santos and José Mattoso in relation to the metanarratives of the Portuguese nation and the weakened maritime-colonial past. Similarly, chapter 2 discusses dominant notions of Brazilian national identity in the twentieth century and provides a succinct introduction to the works of Gilberto Freyre and Buarque de Holanda amongst other prominent intellectuals. Chapters 3 and 4 focus respectively on the contributions of Brazilian gay male writers, in particular Caio Fernando Abreu, and Portuguese women writers, especially Maria Isabel Barreno. Here Arenas skillfully couches his remarks in the Brazilian historical period known as the "opening" and the Portuguese post-revolutionary era, and provides what can be considered a most valuable analysis of alternative perspectives to those advanced in chapters 1 and 2: in these chapters Arenas considers authors who incorporate key aspects of human subjectivity such as sexuality and gender into their works, and discusses how these factors are written into the micronarratives of nation. Chapter 5 focuses on authors such as Vergílio Ferreira, Clarice Lispector and José Saramago who have actively engaged the question of utopias and subjectivity. The study concludes with some brief comparative remarks regarding the status of the discourse of nationhood in relation to globalization and posits that the Luso-Brazilian literary space constitutes a privileged locus from which to reflect upon the weakening of utopian and national questions to post-national concerns.

Utopias of Otherness clearly presents as one of its main statements the greater need for transatlantic approaches to the literatures, histories and cultures of Portugal and Brazil given their continued presence in each other's national life. As a valuable contribution to debates concerning globalization, postcolonialism and postmodernism, Utopias of Otherness provides a solid basis for future elaboration. It also has the merit of being one of the first book-length studies written in English (or in any language for that matter) that deal with nationhood and subjectivity in relation to the literatures of Portugal and Brazil. Arenas has taken great care to explain, in comprehensive footnotes, important cultural aspects that might not be familiar outside Luso-Brazilian academic circles. On the other hand, Portuguese and Brazilian specialists will find the transatlantic approach to the thematic aegis of nationhood and subjectivity a valuable tool for teaching and research. It is also commendable that several non-canonical authors such as Maria Gabriela Llansol, even if only briefly, are included in this study and are thus introduced to an English-speaking public. It is expected that Utopias of Otherness will constitute a starting point for further transatlantic studies and will remain a key reference for understanding the complex roots of nationhood, subjectivity and utopias in the post-utopian era of late twentieth-century Portugal and Brazil.