Who He Is
Portuguese quarryman whom João Romão hires for the quarry and installs in room 35 with his wife, Piedade, and a daughter who attends school. He arrives serious, thrifty and respected, and he is the case in which the narrator follows, for more chapters, the milieu acting upon a man: the coffee, the food, the music and Rita Baiana divert him from saving, up to the ambush against Firmo, life with Rita, drink and the remorse for not paying for his daughter's school.
Trajectory
Recommended by Machucas, he asks Romão for seventy milreis and Romão pays fifty; at the quarry he aims the attack at the wrong spot on the rock, and Romão gives in because the accounts add up, since the wage comes back through the grocery (chapter IV). The narrator sees the quarry as a fight of men against a giant; he sees it as poorly managed work.
pareciam um punhado de demônios revoltados na sua impotência contra o impassível gigante que os contemplava com desprezo, they looked like a handful of demons, rebelling in their impotence against the impassive giant who regarded them with contempt
He arrives with Piedade at room 35, and the chapter tells where he comes from: a colonist on a plantation, two years of work with no result, then the quarry, the savings and his daughter's school (chapter V).
mourejou durante dois anos, sem nunca levantar a cabeça, e de onde afinal se retirou de mãos vazias e uma grande birra pela lavoura brasileira, he toiled for two years without ever lifting his head, and from where he finally withdrew with empty hands and a great grudge against Brazilian farming
Within two months the boss begins to respect him, and the grocery's shop assistants want him as their boss (chapter V).
Aquele é que devia ser o patrão, diziam. É um homem sério e destemido! Com aquele ninguém brinca!, That one ought to be the boss, they said. He's a serious and fearless man! Nobody messes with that one!
At night he plays fados on the guitar with his wife at the door (chapter V), and at the Sunday pagode the fado loses to the chorado of Firmo and Porfiro, while Rita dances in the middle of the circle; he forgets Piedade and the hours, and at dawn, alone in the courtyard, he decides not to sleep (chapter VII).
Naquela mulata estava o grande mistério, a síntese das impressões que ele recebeu chegando aqui, in that mulatta lay the great mystery, the synthesis of the impressions he received on arriving here
The next day he falls ill, Rita treats him with strong coffee and parati, and the touch of her skin awakens desire (chapter VIII). In the following weeks he starts taking Rita's coffee and parati every morning, trades salt cod for black beans, leaves his wife's bed for a hammock, and loses the energy of his first days (chapter IX).
pouco a pouco, se foram reformando todos os seus hábitos singelos de aldeão português: e Jerônimo abrasileirou-se, little by little all his simple habits as a Portuguese villager were reformed: and Jerônimo became Brazilianized
One night at a samba he whispers a proposal to Rita, Firmo challenges him, wins the first part of the fight with feet and head, and loses to the cudgel until he draws the razor and wounds him in the belly (chapter X). The narrator measures the two of them before the blow.
Jerônimo era alto, espadaúdo, construção de touro, pescoço de Hércules, punho de quebrar um coco com um murro: era a força tranquila, o pulso de chumbo. O outro, franzino, um palmo mais baixo que o português, pernas e braços secos, agilidade de maracajá: era a força nervosa; era o arrebatamento que tudo desbarata no sobressalto do primeiro instante. Um, sólido e resistente; o outro, ligeiro e destemido, mas ambos corajosos., Jerônimo was tall, broad-shouldered, built like a bull, with the neck of Hercules and a fist that could crack a coconut with one blow: he was the calm strength, the pulse of lead. The other, slight, a span shorter than the Portuguese, with thin arms and legs and the agility of a maracajá: he was nervous strength, the rush that overturns everything in the shock of the first instant. One solid and enduring, the other quick and fearless, but both brave.
At the tenement he tells the doctor they were only playing, accepts Rita's tenderness as compensation for the wound, and goes to the hospital of the Order of Santo Antônio, of which he is a member (chapter XI). He comes back thin, asks for the coffee made by her instead of Piedade's, complains about his wife, and sets aside eighty milreis for the deal with Zé Carlos and Pataca (chapter XIV).
Não digo mal, mas confesso que não encontro nela umas tantas coisas que desejava..., I don't speak ill of her, but I confess I don't find in her quite a few things I wished for...
On the beach he is one of the three men who beat Firmo to death; he pays four twenty-milreis notes to his companions, keeps the razor, and knocks on Rita's door to say he has killed the rival and to propose they leave together, leaving his wife the savings and his daughter's school (chapter XV). The narrator explains the turn through the milieu, and Jerônimo offers the crime as proof of love.
cedendo às imposições mesológicas, enfarava a esposa, sua congênere, e queria a mulata, giving in to the pressures of the milieu, he tired of his wife, his own kind, and wanted the mulatta
estou disposto a tudo para ficar contigo, I am willing to do anything to stay with you
He returns to the quarry, this time the one at São Diogo, and lives with Rita in Cidade Nova, where he spends his wages on the house; he promises Piedade to pay the school and does not, because he is already in debt against his wages, owes the baker, and fears crossing his lover (chapter XIX). On her second visit, drunk, he sends her away and says the daughter will stay with him (chapter XIX).
só a ideia de separar-se da amante punha-lhe logo o sangue doido e apagava-se-lhe de novo a luz dos raciocínios, the mere idea of separating from his lover at once set his blood racing wildly and snuffed out again the light of his reasoning
Jerônimo apareceu afinal, com um ar triste de vicioso envergonhado que não tem ânimo de deixar o vício., Jerônimo finally appeared, with the sad look of an ashamed addict who lacks the spirit to give up his vice.
Themes Embodied
The standard themes that run through him are Nature and Civilization, Work and Vocation, and Sexuality. The symbol that accompanies him on stage is the fado and the chorado, the guitar with which he plays fados at the end of the day (chapter V) and the music that replaces it at the pagode (chapter VII); the other is the quarry, where he wins Romão's respect (chapter IV).
The text never decides whether Jerônimo yields to the milieu or chooses. The narrator explains the change through external causes, the heat, the food and the music (chapter IX, chapter XV), but the scenes show his decisions: he pays the helpers, keeps the razor, postpones the school (chapter XV, chapter XIX). He knows he is wrong, and drink silences the voice that reproaches him (chapter XIX).
Jerônimo is the symmetrical figure of João Romão: both are Portuguese who arrive to build a nest egg, but the shopkeeper accumulates while the quarryman ends up owing the baker and the man at the grocery. What the book takes from him in money, savings and standing, he takes out on his family, and the first to pay is Piedade.
Relationships
- Piedade: the wife he leaves, to whom he promises the money for school, and who waits for him on the night of the ambush.
- Rita Baiana: the woman in whom he concentrates the impressions of the land, and with whom he lives after Firmo's death.
- Firmo: the rival who wounds him with the razor and whom he helps kill on the beach.
- João Romão: the boss who profits from his seriousness and comes to respect him.