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YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY FROM THE REBELYEARS OF POP LITERATURE TO THE MAGICAL REALISM OF ROBERTO DRUMMOND PAULA RODRIGUES PONTES ROBERTO Drummond (1939-2002) is a Brazilian writer from the state of Minas Gerais, which is the biggest state in the southeastern region of the country, birthplace of important authors of Brazilian literature, such as Guimarães Rosa and Carlos Drummond de Andrade. Drummond is part of a generation of writers that participated in the short story “boom” of the seventies in Brazil. As stated by Alfredo Bosi, he was part of this creative group, along with authors such as Sérgio Sant’anna and Sônia Coutinho. It is within this context that he began his publishing career in 1975, with his prize-winning collection of short stories A morte de D. J. em Paris. This book was awarded the “Prêmio Jabuti” in the category for new authors and some of his short stories received awards in the “Concurso de Contos do Paraná” (Paraná’s State Short Stories Award). In the following years, Drummond published O dia em que Ernest Hemingway morreu crucificado (1978), Sangue de CocaCola (1980), Quando fui morto em Cuba (1981), Hitler manda lembran ças (1984), Ontem à noite era 6a . feira (1988), Hilda Furacão (1991), Inês é morta (1993), O homem que subornou a morte (1999), O cheiro de Deus (2001). Since his first publication, Drummond has been an active author and journalist. His book O homem que subornou a morte (1999) is a collection of “crônicas.” He also wrote about sports for a major newspaper in Minas Gerais. After his untimely death in 2002, three books were published: Os mortos não dançam valsa (2002), Dia de São Nunca a Tarde (2004) and Roberto Drummond (2005) (collection of crônicas). In this study, I will analyze O cheiro de Deus to show how Drummond evolved from the pop literature, developing a more traditional style. YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY 115 Drummond’s work deals with the fragile line between fiction and reality. Therefore, he plays with history and literature, using real figures as characters, “fictionizing” reality. During the dictatorship in Brazil (1964-1984), reality had to be disguised in order to escape governmental censorship. For Drummond, this need to disguise was also an element of what he classified as “literatura pop.” As a new form of literature, pop literature makes extensive use of icons from popular culture and incorporates narrative styles derived from cartoons. The author explained that the popular entered his books as signs of contemporaneity. According to Stuart Hall, the pop is a way to construct reality when the author has the reader as an accomplice once they share the same knowledge about the pop elements. (In Brazil, it is a way of criticizing society. Drummond also points out foreign influence in the country, especially during the Military Dictatorship.) Idelber Avelar explains that the incorporation on the pop element might be called the “post-modern strategy,” that is, the attempt to erase the boundaries between erudite and mass cultures by combining procedures from both. (. . .) the postmodern strategy looks to recuperate the massive readership enjoyed by literature in the nineteenth century, now lost to the mass media. Instead of resolutely differentiating itself from all conventions of mass culture, as is the case with the poetics of negativity, the postmodern novel appropriates them and makes them part of its repertoire: cutting and montage, fluidity and quickness of style, suspense, dramatic identification, and so forth, are all stylistic traits borrowed from mass culture and now made central to the contemporary novel. (187) Although Drummond’s first books were full of this pop impact, with many references to pop culture, through the years he starts to shift a little in the direction of a more sophisticated writing. If the first books were usually short, with a lot of impact, later in his career his books started to give a way to a more elaborate writing with more development of characters. As the author himself has stated in an interview in 2001: eu fiz [literatura pop], e antes era uma maneira de configurar um país ocupado pelo estrangeiro. Hoje é diferente, eu não tenho a preocupação com o...

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