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This book is about contemporary Brazilian fiction from the past two decades and concerned with the possibilities of literary intervention in the reality of the historical moment. Thus, an understanding of the actual role of literature is strategic in the definition of the contemporary, and the book shows an optimism among current writers and artists with respect to the aesthetic, ethical, and political role of literature and art in the twentieth century.
In contemporary Brazilian prose, two simultaneous ambitions are often reconciled. The commitment to individual or social reality is a challenge that is assumed without thereby necessarily accepting and following the molds of the traditional search for national or cultural identities. This foundation is one of the constants of contemporary prose, without thereby eliminating the continuous existence of a formal experimentalism that is the clearest heir of the modernist project.
The timely publication of Affect and Realism in Contemporary Brazilian Fiction makes the work of one of Brazil’s foremost literary scholars available to the English-speaking public. Written with clarity, elegance and erudition, this brilliant volume combines theoretical depth with a shrewd assessment of the main trends in contemporary Brazilian fiction. — Luiz Fernando Valente, Professor of Portuguese and Brazilian Studies and Comparative Literature, Brown University
Preface; 1. The Contemporary in Current Brazilian Literature; 2. Realisms in Question; 3. A Paper World—Reflections on the Realism of Luiz Ruffato; 4. Brazilian Literature and the Market; 5. The Victorious Return of the Self in Contemporary Writing; 7. The Challenge of the Sensible and the Sublime Revisited; 8. Farewell to the Contemporary!; Bibliography; Index.