One Hundred Years after Tomorrow: Brazilian Women's Fiction in the Twentieth Century

Emi Bulhões Carvalho da Fonseca / In the Silence of the Big House (1944)

Emi Bulhoes Carvalho da Fonseca Like Sra. Leandro Dupre, Emi Bulhoes Carvalho da Fonseca was a prolific and widely read author of the 1940s and 1950s. A Carioca by birth, she published her first book, a collection of stories entitled No Silincio da Casa Grande (In the Silence of the Big House) in 1944. That year, the book was awarded the Afonso Arinos Prize for best fiction. Two years later, in 1946, she published the novel Mona Lisa, which was followed by 0 Oitavo Pecado (1947) (The Eighth Sin), Joia (1948) (Jewel), Pedras Altas (1949) (High Rocks), Anoiteceu na Charneca (1951) (Nightfall on the Moors), and Lua Cinzenta (1953 ) (Gray Moon). Among her best known works is Desquite Amigdvel(1965) (Friendly Separation), about the difficulties couples endured in a country where divorce was prohibited. Carvalho da Fonseca's career spanned nearly four decades, and her fiction provides insights into important aspects of the Brazilian experience . Unfortunately, like several of her contemporaries, she is now an almost forgotten author. 76 In the Silence of the Big House (1944) It is the moment near dawn. The sleeping world gives a kind of grimace, anxiously flutters its eyes, opens its mouth and gulps. Everything is in a state of suspension, palpitating, as it senses the agony of a land turning cold, fading, and growing pale. . . . But there, up ahead, trembling and indecisive, is a promise of resurrection and life, a rustling. Day is about to begin. In bed, still unconscious, Natalina feels the grazing touch of the cold wings of the angel of death, who shoulders the night, and she pulls the red coverlet's thick baize up under her chin. She has slept soundly and is about to awaken. But she doesn't feel the pleasant sensation that comes with a good night's rest. A painful feeling weighs on her chest, at a point directly over her heart. She's still asleep. Only the first layer of her being is awakening as it rises out of some deep thing that suffocates and anguishes her. And unpleasant memories come forth, one by one, like bubbles rising to the surface.... Suddenly, the memory of her disgrace, of the horrible suffering she endured, chases away all sleep. She awakens in agony, trying not to accept the reality' of the cruel scenes she recalls so vividly. Turning her face to the side, she feels relief as she lets the tears stream down her face and onto the pillow, whose thick fabric absorbs them completely. In the darkness, much calmer now, she remembers the horrible scene that seems to have happened yesterday, or perhaps it was a few days ago, she's not sure, having lost all sense of time. But what comes to her mind are older memories, much much older. She sees herself as a little girl. How old must she be? Three, four . . . . She's with the other slaves and at the side of her mother, who, always busy and burdened with work, rails at her continuously. Her mother's hands. Large, very dark on the back, the palms almost whiteactive , thick hands. As if hypnotized, she follows their movements as they plunge into the blue water of the washing tub, then pull out the undergarments, soaping and pounding their twisted form, then soaping them again and going back into the water. From time to time, the hands 77 78 Em; Bulhiies Carvalho da Fonseca busy themselves over her; she feels their roughness as they rapidly dress her or take hold of her arm. Utilitarian gestures. Never an embrace. But then she doesn't know about that kind of thing, so she doesn't find the absence of any affection strange. She learns her first lesson in life-that the rough hands of the poor are instruments of work and nothing more. She sees herself sitting on a stone step. She's wearing a little white shift, a weightless rag on her body. The garden is filled with sun. She feels intensely happy to be alive and is enchanted by the pebbles she's gathering from a crack near the door. Further ahead, she spies a gray one, a veritable treasure. She moves quickly in order to grab it before someone.... She takes off running on little crooked legs whose small black feet are smooth, flat, and dirty from the soil. But just as she bends over, her face filled with...