João Guimarães Rosa between Life and Death in His Own Páramo

Abstract

Joao Guimaraes Rosa (1908–1967) was a narrative writer whose temperament and instincts were practically the opposite of prosaic, plainspoken Erico Verissimo’s.1 However, Guimaraes Rosa agreed with the centrality of affection in the search for any kind of meaningful knowledge, he being imbued with a deep love for language and its power, and for nature and its beauty. Guimaraes Rosa believed affection somehow protected his fiction against what he saw as the excesses of rationalism, something he once famously called “the Cartesian bete noire” (“a megera cartesiana”) (Bizarri, 90). The same could be said for religious faith, natural religion in the Hegelian sense. Guimaraes Rosa was a man of faith, but quite heterodox; I would even dare say that he was typically Brazilian in his decision to believe pragmatically or, at least in principle, to be interested in all religious beliefs. In this sense, Guimaraes Rosa had a lot in common with his most famous character, Riobaldo, who says in Grande Sertao: Veredas: “Here, I do not miss an opportunity for religion. I take advantage of all of them. I drink from all rivers … Just one, for me, is not much, perhaps it may not suffice.”2 His interest in mystery included superstitions. For example, although unanimously elected to the Real Academia Brasileira de Letras (Brazilian Academy of Letters) in 1963, Guimaraes Rosa delayed the official inaugural ceremony for four years—the maximum length of time that his diplomatic ability afforded him.