The Theme in the Work
Slavery enters The Slum through a person, Bertoleza, and the book shows it in three phases. In the first, she is the enslaved woman of a blind old man, pays her owner twenty milreis a month and saves to buy her manumission (chapter I). In the second, João Romão reads her a letter of freedom that he himself forged, keeps her money and lets her believe herself free, while she goes on without Sunday or holy day (chapter I, chapter VI). In the third, when marriage to the daughter of Miranda makes her a burden, he returns her to her master by legal means (chapter XXI, chapter XXIII).
Around her the theme appears in smaller figures: Botelho, a former slave broker, who treats abolition as an after-dinner hatred (chapter II); Rita Baiana, who calls marriage captivity (chapter VI); and the close of the book, in which the committee of abolitionists reaches the door of the warehouse where the enslaved woman has just wounded herself (chapter XXIII).
The book also shows what slavery does, day to day, to Bertoleza after the false letter. In Romão's rise she becomes more enslaved and sadder (chapter XIII); when she senses the smell of other women on him, she stops being a lover to become only a work slave (chapter XIX); in her last months she lives on edge, eats only what she herself prepares and sleeps with the door locked (chapter XXII).
The book gives Bertoleza's facts in order and lets the contrast work: the woman whom the false letter gave the illusion of freedom is the one the law returns to captivity, and the one who returns her is the man whom the abolitionists come to honor. Botelho, who lived by buying and selling people, is the one who asks the question that gives Romão his way out (chapter II, chapter XXI). The text does not comment on the coincidence, and it is up to the reader to decide what the ending asks to be put together: the reputation Romão built or the act he commissioned.
Where It Appears
- Chapter I: Bertoleza pays her owner wages and saves for her manumission; when her companion dies, Romão keeps the money, reads her a forged letter of freedom, and only calms down when the old master dies.
- Chapter II: Botelho, a former slave broker who lost his fortune, turns the desserts at Miranda's house into an outlet for his hatred of the abolition that was beginning.
- Chapter VI: On Sunday everyone changes clothes and only Bertoleza stays at the stove; Rita says that marrying means getting yourself a captivity.
- Chapter XIII: In Romão's rise, Bertoleza becomes more enslaved and sadder; after dinner at the Baron's house he asks himself what would happen if she died.
- Chapter XIX: Bertoleza senses the smell of other women on her lover and stops being a lover to become only a work slave.
- Chapter XXI: Bertoleza overhears the conversation and demands to stay by his side; Botelho asks whether she was a slave, and Romão sees the way out: return her to her owner, a certain Freitas de Melo.
- Chapter XXII: Bertoleza lives on edge, eats only what she herself prepares and sleeps with the door locked.
- Chapter XXIII: The owner arrives with two soldiers; Bertoleza recognizes the son of her former master, understands the lie of the letter and wounds herself with the knife; the committee of abolitionists enters with the diploma of honorary member.
Passages
Bertoleza works, pays her owner and saves for her manumission.
pagava de jornal a seu dono vinte mil-réis por mês, e, apesar disso, tinha de parte quase que o necessário para a alforria, she paid her owner twenty milreis a month in wages, and yet had set aside almost what she needed for her manumission
The letter of freedom is the work of the one who reads it.
a tal carta de liberdade era obra do próprio João Romão, e nem mesmo o selo, que ele entendeu de pespegar-lhe em cima, para dar à burla maior formalidade, representava despesa porque o esperto aproveitara uma estampilha já servida, that so-called letter of freedom was the work of João Romão himself, and even the seal he took it into his head to slap on top, to give the sham greater formality, cost nothing, because the clever man had used a stamp already used
Abolition enters Miranda's desserts through Botelho's mouth.
Law of the Free Womb, of September 28, 1871, which declared free the children of enslaved women born from that date on:
o movimento abolicionista que principiava a formar-se em torno da lei Rio Branco, the abolitionist movement that was beginning to take shape around the Rio Branco law
Bertoleza stays at the stove on everyone else's day off.
a Bertoleza, sempre suja e tisnada, sempre sem domingo nem dia santo, lá estava ao fogão, mexendo as panelas e enchendo os pratos, Bertoleza, always dirty and sooty, always without Sunday or holy day, was there at the stove, stirring the pots and filling the plates
From lover to work slave.
pouco a pouco deixara totalmente de ser a amante do vendeiro, para ficar sendo só uma sua escrava, little by little she had stopped being the shopkeeper's lover entirely, to become only his slave
The way out that Botelho's question opens.
entregá-la ao seu senhor, restituí-la legalmente à escravidão., deliver her to her master, legally return her to slavery
The plan presented as a legal act.
Os homenzinhos chegam, reclamam a escrava em nome da lei, e você a entrega, The little men arrive, claim the enslaved woman in the name of the law, and you hand her over
Bertoleza reaches the conclusion on her own.
adivinhou que tinha sido enganada; que a sua carta de alforria era uma mentira, e que o seu amante, não tendo coragem para matá-la, restituía-a ao cativeiro., she realized she had been deceived; that her letter of manumission was a lie, and that her lover, lacking the courage to kill her, was returning her to captivity
The committee arrives at the warehouse door.
Era uma comissão de abolicionistas que vinha, de casaca! trazer-lhe respeitosamente o diploma de sócio benemérito., It was a committee of abolitionists coming, in tailcoats! to respectfully bring him the diploma of honorary member
The dates of the law and of the book.
The Lei Áurea, which abolished slavery in Brazil, is dated May 13, 1888, and The Slum was published in 1890. The enslaved woman returned to her owner and the committee of abolitionists therefore share the same page of a novel written shortly after the end of slavery, about a time when it still held sway.