Symbols

Eyes of Undertow Capitu's eyes reach the reader through two images born in different mouths, on different days, and for different reasons: that of an oblique and dissimulating gypsy, which José Dias pronounces at the Passeio Público, and that of undertow, which Bentinho finds... The Matacavalos House Two houses that the book treats as one. The first is the house in Matacavalos, where Bentinho grew up with Dona Glória, Uncle Cosme, and Cousin Justina, with an orchard that bordered the Pádua backyard. The second is the one the elderly Bento Santiago had... The Inscription on the Wall The names of Bentinho and Capitu fused into a single word, which Capitu scratches with a nail onto the yard wall and which Bentinho reads before she erases it. It is Capitu's first written word in the book, and the narrator copies it in capitals, like someone... The Cup of Coffee The coffee cup in which Bentinho dissolves the poison, on the morning after the theater. First meant for him, it is then offered to Ezequiel, and it is in front of the boy that the father recoils. The symbol gathers the cup, what prepares it (the drug he...