Literary critic Machado de Assis: the french presence in the ellaboration of his writing

Abstract

Throughout his literary career, Machado de Assis also occupied himself with collaborations in newspapers and magazines of his time in which he could, among other things, discuss Brazilian literature. It is possible to find, in such spaces, his production as a literary critic, which has recently been organized into a single volume by Sílvia Maria Azevedo, Adriana Dusilek and Daniela Mantarro Callipo, Machado de Assis: crítica literária e textos diversos (2013), whose articles reveal Machado's constant reflection about the making of critique and literarature in a period in which, according to his conception, there was really no literary critique consolidated in Brazil. From its reading, a style of critique very close to that observed in the French culture can be noticed, particularly in the work of Madame de Staël, Sainte-Beuve, Louis Etienne and Eugène Pelletan, with whom Machado seems to dialogue in an attempt to constitute a way of writing critique. Thus, it is intended to proceed to the analysis of said texts of critique alongside a comparison to those of the aforementioned French writers, with the purpose of verifying at what rate Machado de Assis approaches or distances himself from the then current French model of literary critique. The thesis that Machado absorbs the French models, but modifies them, meaning to create his own ideal model of a critic, collaborating, equally, to the discussion of Brazilian literary critique, is defended.