The Alienist and Other Stories of Nineteenth-Century Brazil by Machado de Assis Page B
Authors: Machado de Assis
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you’ll never guess what I did.”
“Tell us, then. Tell us.”
“I went to get my uniform. I put it on, laced and buttoned it. When I was entirely ready, I raised my eyes again to the mirror and … do I need to tell you? There in the looking glass was a sharp image of my full self with nothing missing, not a line out of place, a second lieutenant in the National Guard who had recovered his external soul. The soul that had departed with Aunt Marcolina and her runaway slaves reappeared to me on the surface of the glass. Imagine a man who emerges, little by little, from a deep lethargy. He opens his unseeing eyes, then begins to distinguish people from objects but without recognizing them. Then he sees this is So-and-So, and that’s somebody else. This is a chair, and that’s a sofa. Gradually, everything returns to what it was before he lost consciousness. That is how it was with me. I walked here and there, raised my arms, smiled, always watching the mirror—and the image reproduced my actions precisely. I no longer felt like a mechanical doll but like a living being. From then on, I was a different person. Every day at a certain time, I put on my uniform and sat in front of the looking glass to read, meditate, and gaze at myself. After two or three hours, I took it off again and, in that manner, was able to get through six more days of solitude without trouble …”
When his listeners regained their senses, the narrator had gone.
CHAPTER ON HATS
In 1883, the year after “The Looking Glass,” Machado published two excellent stories in which women are central characters. “ Capítulo dos chapeus ,” which takes its title from a play by Moliere, is told as a mock epic: “Sing, Muse!” Rather than epic heroism, however, the story involves a domestic spat. Though he often wrote for women, Machado de Assis wasn’t a feminist, and we are invited to laugh here at the expense of the story’s female protagonists, Mariana and Sophia. But even Machado’s flawed characters, which includes about all of them, usually manage to be sympathetic to some degree. This story is lighthearted satire rather than deadly irony. In it, we see the world of women of the elite class whom a gentleman might invite to drop by the Chamber of Deputies. Like Gonçalves and his student friends, they go to see and be seen on Ouvidor Street, but only during the day. As respectable ladies, they could never be out at night without a male escort. They rule over homes in comfortable residential neighborhoods (served by streetcars) and over domestic slaves, who appear in this story hardly at all. Their lives are consumed by an annual round of elite activities: attending operas, horse races, and fancy balls, going to spend the hottest months of the year in Petrópolis, the mountain resort city not far from Rio de Janeiro, where Pedro II built a summer palace. Welcome to their world.
M use, sing of the annoyance of Mariana, wife of the right honorable Conrado Seabra, on that April morning in 1879. What was the cause of all the fuss? Just a hat! Lightweight, rather natty, not an elegant, top hat …
Conrado, a lawyer with an office on Quitanda Street, wore it every day on his way downtown and to court hearings, as well. He only didn’t wear it to formal receptions, the opera, funerals, and other such ceremonious occasions. Otherwise, he had worn it constantly for the last five or six years, the entire length of his marriage. Then, on that particular April morning, having finished his breakfast, Conrado began to roll himself a cigarette, and Mariana announced with a smile that she had a small request.
“What is it, my angel?”
“Could you do something for me, make a sacrifice on my behalf?”
“One sacrifice? Why … ten or twenty!”
“Then don’t wear that hat anymore to go downtown.”
“Why? Is it hideous?”
“I’m not saying it’s hideous. It’s a hat for around the neighborhood, a hat to wear in the afternoon or at
“Tell us, then. Tell us.”
“I went to get my uniform. I put it on, laced and buttoned it. When I was entirely ready, I raised my eyes again to the mirror and … do I need to tell you? There in the looking glass was a sharp image of my full self with nothing missing, not a line out of place, a second lieutenant in the National Guard who had recovered his external soul. The soul that had departed with Aunt Marcolina and her runaway slaves reappeared to me on the surface of the glass. Imagine a man who emerges, little by little, from a deep lethargy. He opens his unseeing eyes, then begins to distinguish people from objects but without recognizing them. Then he sees this is So-and-So, and that’s somebody else. This is a chair, and that’s a sofa. Gradually, everything returns to what it was before he lost consciousness. That is how it was with me. I walked here and there, raised my arms, smiled, always watching the mirror—and the image reproduced my actions precisely. I no longer felt like a mechanical doll but like a living being. From then on, I was a different person. Every day at a certain time, I put on my uniform and sat in front of the looking glass to read, meditate, and gaze at myself. After two or three hours, I took it off again and, in that manner, was able to get through six more days of solitude without trouble …”
When his listeners regained their senses, the narrator had gone.
CHAPTER ON HATS
In 1883, the year after “The Looking Glass,” Machado published two excellent stories in which women are central characters. “ Capítulo dos chapeus ,” which takes its title from a play by Moliere, is told as a mock epic: “Sing, Muse!” Rather than epic heroism, however, the story involves a domestic spat. Though he often wrote for women, Machado de Assis wasn’t a feminist, and we are invited to laugh here at the expense of the story’s female protagonists, Mariana and Sophia. But even Machado’s flawed characters, which includes about all of them, usually manage to be sympathetic to some degree. This story is lighthearted satire rather than deadly irony. In it, we see the world of women of the elite class whom a gentleman might invite to drop by the Chamber of Deputies. Like Gonçalves and his student friends, they go to see and be seen on Ouvidor Street, but only during the day. As respectable ladies, they could never be out at night without a male escort. They rule over homes in comfortable residential neighborhoods (served by streetcars) and over domestic slaves, who appear in this story hardly at all. Their lives are consumed by an annual round of elite activities: attending operas, horse races, and fancy balls, going to spend the hottest months of the year in Petrópolis, the mountain resort city not far from Rio de Janeiro, where Pedro II built a summer palace. Welcome to their world.
M use, sing of the annoyance of Mariana, wife of the right honorable Conrado Seabra, on that April morning in 1879. What was the cause of all the fuss? Just a hat! Lightweight, rather natty, not an elegant, top hat …
Conrado, a lawyer with an office on Quitanda Street, wore it every day on his way downtown and to court hearings, as well. He only didn’t wear it to formal receptions, the opera, funerals, and other such ceremonious occasions. Otherwise, he had worn it constantly for the last five or six years, the entire length of his marriage. Then, on that particular April morning, having finished his breakfast, Conrado began to roll himself a cigarette, and Mariana announced with a smile that she had a small request.
“What is it, my angel?”
“Could you do something for me, make a sacrifice on my behalf?”
“One sacrifice? Why … ten or twenty!”
“Then don’t wear that hat anymore to go downtown.”
“Why? Is it hideous?”
“I’m not saying it’s hideous. It’s a hat for around the neighborhood, a hat to wear in the afternoon or at
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