In December 1889, a few weeks after the monarchy in Brazil was replaced by a republican government, seventy-year-old USAmerican poet Walt Whitman wrote a poem called “A Christmas Greeting” to welcome the “Brazilian brother” into democracy. Though filled with hope and excitement for yet another republic born in the Americas, Whitman’s “smile from the north” and “expectant eye” upon the Brazilian nation has gone largely unnoticed by literary scholars and theorists, both in and beyond Brazil. This dissertation proceeds by examining the works of three Brazilian writers and cultural figures who “welcomed the American brother”: Ronald de Carvalho (1893–1935), Geir Campos (1924–1999), and Ana Cristina Cesar (1952–1983). I argue that by responding to Whitman’s legacy in their own works, these writers helped to fashion a hemispheric (as opposed to a nationalist) narrative of writing and culture in Brazil. Their engagement with the poetry and figure of Whitman challenges the prevailing cultural and literary conversation Brazilian artists and cultural figures have kept with the literatures, traditions, and politics of the United States across the twentieth century. As such, their works contribute to debates on inter-American affairs and articulate a less stubborn idea of Brasilidade, the distinctively Brazilian cultural identity. This project is revisionist for three reasons: first, it recuperates writers who have pursued the project of a hemispheric Brazil and that have been forgotten by contemporary scholarship. Secondly, this work provides a new approach to cultural rapprochement that reexamines cultural hierarchies implicit in Brazil’s history of colonialism and nationalism. Finally, this research aims to define a blossoming scholarly field called US-Brazilian studies. “‘Welcome, American Brother’” ultimately fosters further growth of U.S.’s hemispheric approaches to the poetry and poetics of Brazil.

Creator

• Anzini, Patrícia

DOI

• https://doi.org/10.21985/n2-va8f-5221

Subject

• Comparative literature
• Latin American studies

Language

• en

Alternate Identifier

• etdadmin_upload_626611
• http://dissertations.umi.com/northwestern:14455

Keyword

• Poetry and Poetics
• Lusophone Studies
• Translation
• Hemispheric/ Transnational Studies
• Walt Whitman
• Brazil

Date created

• 2018-01-01

Resource type

• Dissertation

Rights statement

• In Copyright