Entre fragmentation et réappropriation de l espace : représentations de grandes villes dans le roman brésilien contemporain (1989-2012)

Abstract

This research aims to study the links between the writing of fiction and the urban world in contemporary Brazil. Our purpose is to analyze how, at a time marked by important changes in Brazilian society, a few years after the end of the dictatorship, the fiction grasps the articulation between local specificities and the globalized city, and also the tension between a view of the city as a whole and the fragmentation of urban speeches, areas and practices. In order to better identify the tension between the standardization of megacities and, on other part, local identities, Passageiro do fim do dia (2010) by R. Figueiredo a novel that represents an imaginary city, but dealing with realities of many Brazilian coastal cities will be confronted with seven other novels, which represent real cities of different regional areas. Manaus in the North of the country (Relato de um certo Oriente, by M. Hatoum, 1989), Recife in the North East (Estive lá fora, by R. Correia de Brito, 2012), Brasilia in the Centre West (Cidade livre, by J. Almino, 2010), Curitiba in the South (O fotógrafo, by C. Tezza, 2004), and finally the two big cities of the South East, São Paulo (Eles eram muitos cavalos de L. Ruffato, 2001) and Rio de Janeiro (O Silêncio da Chuva, de L. A. Garcia-Roza, 1996)