The Theme in the Work
Bento Santiago writes to recover the boy he was, and the book shows, from chapter II on, that the project fails. He had built in Engenho Novo a copy of the Matacavalos house to tie the two ends of life and restore adolescence in old age, and he confesses in the same paragraph that he himself is missing: a certificate that gave him twenty years of age would fool strangers, not him (see the Matacavalos house). Chapter LXIV repeats the confession and extends it to the dream: one of man's tasks is to continue, in the old night, the dream interrupted in the young night, and it does not work. Chapter CXLIV closes the series by saying that the old house, visited after his mother's death, no longer knew him.
The memory the book uses is selective, and the narrator declares it. In chapter LIX, he asks the reader to fill in the gaps of what he tells, since he prefers omissive books to confused ones, because in omissive ones one can put in anything; in chapter LIV he lies out of courtesy, pretending to remember a panegyric; in chapter LX he warns that things have color only for those who knew and suffered them in their time; and in chapter LXXX he marks, with "I presume" and "I suppose," the exchange of promise he attributes to his mother. Chapter III also reconstructs words spoken decades earlier and admits he did not hear what was said after the crying. Forgetting also has its test scene: in chapter CX, Capitu says she does not remember the cocada vendor's cry, and Bentinho answers with the little paper he has kept; in chapter CXIV, he tells that, on the night he searched the old papers for the tune, he no longer remembered it.
The heaviest use of memory appears in chapter CXL. After deciding that he was betrayed, Bentinho rereads the past and gathers as evidence what had once seemed to him nothing: the day of the swallows, her word while dreaming. The old episode is the same; the reader has changed. This is the operation of chapter CXLVIII, in which the girl of Matacavalos and the woman of the Glória shore are one, like the fruit within the peel.
The book shows two kinds of memory: the one that tries to restore and fails (the houses, the dreams), and the one that reinterprets and succeeds (the past as proof). The first is confessed lightly; the second the narrator does not name as a method. The difference can be read as the honesty of a man who knows what he cannot reach, or as the asymmetry that sustains the novel: the past that would console is out of reach, and what accuses always comes to hand.
Where It Appears
- Chapter II: Old Bentinho explains that he had built in Engenho Novo a copy of the Matacavalos house to tie the two ends of life, and that the project fails because he himself is missing.
- Chapter III: In November 1857, behind the parlor door at Matacavalos, Bentinho hears José Dias denounce the courtship; the narrator reconstructs words from decades earlier and admits he did not hear what was said afterward.
- Chapter LIV: Bento lies to a former classmate, saying he kept the Panegyric of Saint Monica; the next day he receives a copy twenty-six years old and pretends to recognize passages.
- Chapter LIX: Bento says his memory is weak, like someone who has lived in inns without keeping names, and prefers omissive books to confused ones, because in omissive ones the reader can fill the gaps.
- Chapter LX: Bento recalls that the cocada vendor's cry, which makes him homesick, means nothing to the musician who reads the score, and concludes that things have color only for those who knew and suffered them in their time.
- Chapter LXIV: Rereading the seminary dream, Bento admits that the house in Engenho Novo did not tie the two ends of life, and says it is man's task to continue in the old night the dream of the young night.
- Chapter LXXVII: Old Bentinho confesses that the pains of the season of adolescent love were spiritualized to the point of dissolving into pleasure, and that telling them reminds him of other annoyances he does not want to recall.
- Chapter LXXX: To explain his mother, the narrator marks with "I presume" and "I suppose" the exchange of promise she would have made, and tells of her secret hope as something he later came to suspect.
- Chapter CX: Capitu says she does not remember the cocada vendor's cry of Matacavalos, and Bentinho answers with the little paper he has kept since São Paulo; she plays the sixteen notes on the keyboard and then sings it to their son.
- Chapter CXIV: Bentinho explains that he had the tune of the cry written down because he and Capitu had sworn not to forget it, and that on the night he searched the old papers for it, he no longer remembered it.
- Chapter CXL: With the separation decided, Bentinho rereads the past and gathers as evidence Capitu's word while dreaming and the look on the afternoon of the swallows, which then seemed to him nothing.
- Chapter CXLIV: On the inspection visit after his mother's death, Bentinho sees that the Matacavalos house, with its aroeira, its pitangueira and its well, no longer recognizes him, and lets them demolish it.
- Chapter CXLVIII: Bentinho says the rest of the book is knowing whether the Capitu of the Glória shore was already inside the Capitu of Matacavalos, and answers with the image of the fruit within the peel.
Passages
The old man says what he wanted to do with the house.
O meu fim evidente era atar as duas pontas da vida, e restaurar na velhice a adolescência., My evident aim was to tie together the two ends of life, and to restore adolescence in old age.
And what the copy does not fool.
Uma certidão que me desse vinte anos de idade poderia enganar os estranhos, como todos os documentos falsos, mas não a mim., A certificate that gave me twenty years of age could fool strangers, like all false documents, but not me.
Bento confesses the project's defeat.
ligar as duas pontas da vida, o que aliás não alcancei, to join the two ends of life, which, by the way, I did not achieve
Bento justifies the small lie he tells a colleague.
era cortesia, era quase caridade recordar alguma lauda, it was courtesy, it was almost charity to recall some page
The reading rule the narrator gives himself.
Nada se emenda bem nos livros confusos, mas tudo se pode meter nos livros omissos., Nothing is mended well in confused books, but anything can be put into omissive ones.
What memory does not transmit to those who did not live it.
é preciso que a gente os tenha conhecido e padecido no tempo, sem o que tudo é calado e incolor, one must have known them and suffered them in their time, without which everything is mute and colorless
Bentinho says what time did to the pain.
as dores daquela quadra, a tal ponto se espiritualizaram com o tempo, que chegam a diluir-se no prazer, the pains of that season became so spiritualized with time that they come to dissolve into pleasure
Once the sentence is decided, the past becomes evidence.
Agora lembrava-me tudo o que então me pareceu nada., Now I remembered everything that then seemed like nothing to me.
The old house does not recognize him.
toda a casa me desconheceu, the whole house failed to recognize me
The image with which the book closes the question.
uma estava dentro da outra, como a fruta dentro da casca, one was inside the other, like the fruit inside the rind