SELEÇÃO DE AUTORES <strong>BRASILEIROS</strong> Selection of Brazilian authors
Brazilian Classics A selection of authors with works in public domain 14 ADOLFO CAMINHA (1867 – 1897) Adolfo Caminha led off in Brazil, in 1895, the fiction featuring homosexuality as leading theme. As a result, he was attacked and banished from the critic's memory for a long time. In the same Bom-Crioulo (Good Nigger), in the periphery of the issue referred to above, other issues come up, such as masturbation in public places, disobedience, and drunkenness, three attitudes that used then to be punished with whipping by the navy – which happens to be the setting where this realistic novel takes place. In other books like A Normalista (The Normal School Student), for instance, he deals with themes regarded as banned by the social and political order in force: incest and adultery, among the others. The daring fictionist won considerable relevance when the minorities started to openly demand the legitimacy of their differences. He is, therefore, a novelist for the present times. Review Main works Excerpt Good Nigger And, just like it had happened before, the Good- Nigger was deeply silent under the beating of the whip. He was mute as he was flogged, contorting at each blow under the excruciating pain that split him from head to toe, as if his entire body were an open wound, live and relentless... a stertorous and imperceptible grunt died in his throat, anguished, oppressed, and dry; the muscles in his face expanded in galvanic contractions; his churned blood roared inside the arteries, in the heart, in the innermost of his physical nature, throbbing, torrential, in a colossal plethora! He would suffer the pain with that wild pride of a wounded animal, which cannot avenge because is constrained, and dies without a groan, with the glance lit by impotent wrath! The big scandal "The publication of Bom-Crioulo (Good Nigger), in 1895, in the full late naturalism, was one of the biggest scandals the Brazilian literature ever saw. Even a lawsuit was about to be filed. The reason – relatively mundane today – was the novel leading theme. That was the first time such a theme had been dealt with in our fiction: the loving affair between two men or, more specifically between two sailors: Amaro, a black man nicknamed the Good Nigger, and Aleixo, a handsome blonde seaman." (Letícia Malard, Amaro, o mau bom-crioulo) The earthshaker "Caminha is, above all, a misfit in cynicism and hypocrisy. This is why he amanages to be so faithful to human conflicts. In the course of his life, the author never gave in imperiling basic attitudes." (Francisco Carlos Teixeira da Silva, Adolfo Caminha: um mundo dividido) Judite e Lágrimas de um crente (1887); A normalista (1893); No país dos Yankees (1894); Bom-Crioulo (1895); Cartas literárias (1895); Tentação (1896); Trechos escolhidos (1960).
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