Novel
The Sad End of Policarpo Quaresma
Triste fim de Policarpo Quaresma
Synopsis
Policarpo Quaresma, an official at the Ministry of War in Rio at the end of the nineteenth century and a fervent nationalist, has spent years studying everything Brazilian: he learns Tupi and the guitar, and asks the Chamber of Deputies to make Tupi the official language. Mocked by the press, he is committed to the asylum, where only his goddaughter Olga and his guitar teacher come to see him. On his release, he buys a country property to prove the fertility of Brazilian soil, but ants, weeds and local politics ruin his efforts.
Context
The novel appeared as a serial in the Jornal do Commercio from August to October 1911, then in volume form in 1915. It is divided into three parts, the guitar lesson, the retreat to the countryside and the patriots, and is set under the presidency of Floriano Peixoto, against the background of the navy's revolt against the government. Toda Matéria places it in Pre-Modernism, for its familiar language, its irony and its critique of favouritism and bureaucracy; it demythologises the “Iron Marshal” and the army.
Who it is for
A novel of about two hundred and seventy pages in its English translation, written in a colloquial and ironic language.
Prizes and reception
Translated into French in 1992 and into English by Penguin Classics in 2015; Paulo Thiago brought it to the screen in 1998.
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