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Year:: 1994
Contributor:: Avelar, Idelber (author)
Genre:: articles
Subject:: Modernism (Literature) > Brazil > 20th century; Brazilian fiction > 20th century; Thinking; Paradoxes; Logic; Rosa, João Guimarães > 1908-1967
Extent:: pp. 9-23
DOI: https://doi.org/10.26300/3s0w-cn26

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Abstract:: This paper examines the status of binary oppositions in Guimarães Rosa's ‘Grande sertão: veredas.’ It is my contention that the negative poles of such dichotomies function, in Rosa's novel, as the constitutive element of the positive pole itself. By showing how plenitude, language and presence are constituted by the very emptiness, silence and absence that they negate, Rosa undermines hierarchical dichotomies that have structured Western thought for centuries. The binarisms on which Rosa focuses are then studied in their relation to the roles of time, memory and space in the novel. Deleuzian logic of sense proved suitable here, since the logical component of the problem seems to foreground a paradoxical structure, one that affirms both senses at the same time. My approach thus runs counter to the prevailing interpretation of the dichotomic problem in Rosa which, influenced by dialectics, attempts to resolve and unify polarities in a synthesis. My reading, informed by contemporary theory of paradox, focuses on how bisections emerge, rather than on how to reunify them.; Este artigo examina o status das oposições binárias em "Grande sertão: veredas" de Guimarães Rosa. Defende-se a tese de que os pólos negativos de tais dicotomias funcionam, no romance de Rosa, como o elemento constitutivo do próprio pólo positivo. Ao mostrar como plenitude, linguagem e presença são constituídas pelo próprio vazio – o silêncio e a ausência que negam –, Rosa enfraquece as dicotomias hierárquicas que estruturaram o pensamento ocidental por séculos. Os binarismos nos quais Rosa se concentra são então estudados em sua relação com as funções do tempo, da memória e do espaço no romance. A lógica deleuziana do sentido mostrou-se adequada aqui, já que o componente lógico do problema parece destacar uma estrutura paradoxal, que afirma os dois sentidos ao mesmo tempo. Minha abordagem, portanto, vai contra a interpretação prevalecente do problema dicotômico de Rosa, que, influenciada pela dialética, tenta resolver e unificar as polaridades em uma síntese. Minha leitura, informada pela teoria contemporânea do paradoxo, enfoca como as bissecções emergem, e não como reunificá-las.

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Avelar, Idelber, "The paradoxes of emptiness and absence in 'Grande Sertão: Veredas'" (1994). BRASIL/BRAZIL: A Journal of Brazilian Literature. Brown Digital Repository. Brown University Library. https://doi.org/10.26300/3s0w-cn26

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BRASIL/BRAZIL Vol. 7, no. 11

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BRASIL/BRAZIL: A Journal of Brazilian Literature

BRASIL/BRAZIL: A Journal of Brazilian Literature (ISSN: 2526-4885), founded in 1988, publishes scholarly articles on Brazilian literature and in Comparative Literature with a focus on Brazilian literature, as well as book reviews, interviews with writers, English-language translations of Brazilian literature …

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The paradoxes of emptiness and absence in 'Grande Sertão: Veredas'