Dialogue with the invisible: myth and truth in Dora Ferreira da Silva

Abstract

This project intends to analyze the work of the poet and translator Dora Ferreira da Silva, having as perspective the dialectical tension that takes place when such a poetic work aims to bring back the archaic Greek world - marked by religious thought and mythic - in the twentieth century, where the process of secularization is inevitable to discuss artistic expressions that dialogue with the world of the sacred. One of the names of the recent Brazilian poetry, Dora integrates what the critic Benedito Nunes calls reflective voices of the poetry of the 80s. However, due to peculiarities of her work, she seems dissonant from the contemporary tradition, becoming difficult to locate her among the authors who belong to this contemporary tradition. The main objective of this research is to identify in the poetic work of Dora Ferreira, still not studied a lot, the aspects that make it particularly in the current context, one of them, pointed by her critics, is precisely the presence of an archaic world that Dora requests and appear in her poems like a mythical atmosphere. If contemporary poetry would be geared to reflect on itself ("selfpoetry") and on its truth and power in society, as believes Benedito Nunes, Dora's work would be discussed here just from her choice to bring back this archaic world by placing it in dialogue with a secularized modern world, which leads us to question: is it really appropriate to evoke a past-oriented thinking in a world that seems to act as thinner of tradition? This mythical sacred rescued would make sense, find place, actually helping to establish the poetic truth in Dora and, in some way, to say something about the poet and poetry in the contemporary world?