"Por Andarmos Todos Casy Mesturados": The Politics of Intermingling in Caminha's Carta and Colonial American Anthologies
According to the chronicler of Pedro Álvares Cabral’s arrival on the coast of what is now Brazil in April of 1500, less than a week after their first contact with the Portuguese crew, the natives ‘‘poucos a poucos mesturaranse cõ nosco, e abracauãnos e folgauam’’ (96) [‘‘little by little mingled with us. And they embraced us and had a good time’’] (24). The scribe later portrays the Portuguese as equally engaged in the ‘‘mingling,’’ while also suggesting that their motivation extends beyond ‘‘having a good time’’: ‘‘este dia os uimos de mais perto e mais aanosa vontade por andarmos todos casy mesturados’’ (96, my emphasis) [‘‘On that day we saw them closer and more as we wished, for all of us were almost intermingled’’] (24).1 Such scenes of peaceful intermingling and ‘‘merrymaking’’ (96; 24) between Europeans and Amerindians have earned Pero Vaz deCaminha’s letter toKingManuel a foundational position in the Brazilian literary canon and contributed to notions of the distinctive benevolence of Portuguese colonization. Historians and literary critics alike have interpreted the letter as not only the nation’s ‘‘birth certificate’’ but one that attests to a painless delivery.2 The Carta [Letter] may also earn a place in the early ‘‘American’’ canon, if the trend toward more expansive and inclusive anthologies of colonial American literatures prevails. Susan Castillo and Ivy Schweitzer’s The Literatures of Colonial America (2001) includes an extract of Caminha’s letter, along with selections from both North and South America that are translated from Spanish, Italian, German, Dutch, and various Native American languages. The preface to Carla Mulford’s Early AmericanWritings (2002) claims a similar comprehensiveness, stating that ‘‘texts included represent the cultures of Portuguese, Spanish, French, Dutch, Swedish, German, and English speakers’’ (xviii), although no Portuguese-language texts are in
Re-Discovering Brazilian Literary History: the Case for Translation
Brazilian literary histories are structured either to trace the emergence of an autonomous literature (a “national literature”), or to postulate a “master” cultural gesture (such as “anthropopaghy.”) This article proposes translation as an alternative to these frameworks. First, it offers a rereading of Caminha’s “Carta do Achamento” as a problem of translation, identifying in it three distinct “translation regimes.” Then, it traces the recurring presence of these regimes in major literary events in Brazilian literature in the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries. Ultimately, this model of literary history is aimed at enticing new explorations on diachronic affinities and synchnronic diversity.
Les Sauvages Americains: Representations of Native Americans in French and English Colonial Literature
Algonquian and Iroquois natives of the American Northeast were described in great detail by colonial explorers who ventured into the region in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Beginning with the writings of John Smith and Samuel de Champlain, Gordon Sayre analyzes French and English accounts of Native Americans to reveal the rhetorical codes by which their cultures were represented and the influence that these images of Indians had on colonial and modern American society. By emphasizing the work of Pierre Franaois-Xavier Charlevoix, Joseph-Franaois Lafitau, and Baron de Lahontan, among others, Sayre highlights the important contribution that French explorers and ethnographers made to colonial literature. Sayre's interdisciplinary approach draws on anthropology, cultural studies, and literary methodologies. He cautions against dismissing these colonial texts as purveyors of ethnocentric stereotypes, asserting that they offer insights into Native American cultures. Furthermore, early accounts of American Indians reveal Europeans' serious examination of their own customs and values: Sayre demonstrates how encounters with natives' wampum belts, tattoos, and pelt garments, for example, forced colonists to question the nature of money, writing, and clothing; and how the Indians' techniques of warfare and practice of adopting prisoners led to new concepts of cultural identity and inspired key themes in the European enlightenment and American individualism. |"Gilmore sets out ...to reinterpret turn-of-the-century southern politics from the perspective of middle-class black women activists. She succeeds brilliantly. The book not only reclaims the long-buried stories of a group of richly compelling characters; it also redefines what should count as 'politics' in southern history." American Historical Review