On the borders of the human and the non human: poetics of nature in 20th century Brazilian literature

Abstract

To what extent are non human alterities in contemporary Brazilian literature? How have some Brazilian writers dealt with the paradoxical relations between humanity and animality, as well as with ethno-ecological problems proper to our time? This article addresses the presence of non human beings in works by Nicanor Sena, Astrid Cabral, Olga Savary, Sérgio Medeiros and Josely Vianna Baptista, in the light of a transdisciplinary theoretical framework that includes thinkers such as Ailton Krenak, Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, Dominique Lestel and Donna Haraway. The article also deals with the cultural and textual hybridity that cuts through the works of some authors of our literary repertoire. I thereby show how they present a liminal nature, with a strong transnational bent, as they are shot through by mythological and zoological elements, indigenous legends, diverse literary references, and different geographical and linguistic spaces.