Studies in Honor of Heitor Martins (review)

Fifteen of the papers offered at Indiana University's 2005 colloquium honoring Professor Emeritus Heitor Martins – "21st-Century Lusophone Studies" – have been collected and prefaced by Prof. Sadlier in this varied and interesting volume. Though the majority of the studies (11) deal with aspects of Brazilian literature, politics, history, economic geography and self-awareness, one (Zak Montgomery's "The Reception of the Portuguese Generation of 1870 in Spanish Literary Criticism") treats the role of Spanish "Generation of '68" novelists Leopoldo Alas ("Clarín") and Pardo Bazán in promoting the novels of Eça de Queiroz and nurturing the dream of creating a "Hispano-Portuguese Literary League," while two others – John Dyson's "Hard-Boiled Borges" [the Argentine critic's response to Dashiell Hammett] and William Rougle's "The Soviet Reception of Pablo Neruda: A Historical Overview and Critical Assessment" – deal with peripheral literary subjects, while Walter Mignolo's "The De-Colonial Option and the Meaning of Identity in Politics" surveys various organizational paradigms and suggests possible future Latin American application of Andean indigenous patterns.

Of the eleven papers focusing on Brazilian themes, seven may be categorized as literary. David Jackson's "Poetry and Paradise in the Discovery of Brazil" traces the Renaissance edenic (locus amoenus) ideal and the evolving sense of "paradise" in Brazilian letters from early Colonial times through the writings of Oswald de Andrade and Murilo Mendes; Lúcia Helena's "Fabulações sobre a identidade brasileira: Reflexões em torno do Modernismo" ponders various conflicting facets of Modernism in Brazil, with emphasis on Oswald's works; Lúcia Helena Costigan's "Afro-Brazilian Affirmation in the Eighteenth-Century Portuguese Court Society by Domingos Caldas Barbosa" counterposes optimistic and pessimistic interpretations of the mulatto poet's career and reception in Portugal; Nélson Cerqueira's "Agonizing Memory in Memórias póstumas de Brás Cubas by Machado de Assis and As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner" offers a comparative/contrastive analysis of the protagonists Brás Cubas and Addie in their final hours; and Doris Turner's "Racial Destiny in Rosário Fusco's Auto da noiva" reflects upon the allegorical treatment of "whitening" in that 1946 play within the context of evolving Brazilian ethnic attitudes. Two of the literary studies choose themes from the fiction of João Guimarães Rosa: "Duas faces do poder em Guimarães Rosa: 'Famigerado' e Grande Sertão:Veredas," by Renato Alvim, explores the potential of knowledge, rather than brute force, as a source of strategic strength, while "Dois perfis femininos em Grande Sertão:Veredas," by Moraima Mundo Rios, focuses on various facets and functions of the characters Otacília and Diadorim and their importance for the stability of protagonist Riobaldo.

The remaining four papers of this collection – serving as its "bookends" – treat diverse and complementary aspects of Brazilian self-awareness and economic development and the strategic twentieth-century diplomatic and cultural relations which have taken place between Brazil and its aggressive Anglophone neighbor to the north. Silviano Santiago's initial essay – "Regionalism(s): Before and Beyond Literature, Before and Beyond the Nation-State" – eschews simplistic traditional categorization to envision new interpretations of this key term within the context of Mercosul. Eduardo Brondízio's essay, "Reflexões sobre desmatamento e desenvolvimento na Amazônia," yokes the two processes in a historical overview and laments the marginalization of the majority rural population of that vast area. The final two papers of the collection form a unified pair involving popular culture and the media; journalist Argemiro Ferreira, in his "Fiction, Nostalgia and Reality in the Good Neighbor Policy: Notes from the Past and Ideas for the Future," takes the two Roosevelts – Teddy and F.D.R. – as emblematic of two poles in U.S.-Brazilian relations and ponders the role of Nelson Rockefeller, the OCIAA, Carmen Miranda, and other international actors in the evolution of relations between the two giant nations; and Darlene Sadlier, in her final...