Paternal function: the father's monstrosity in 'A Hora de Dormir', by Santiago Villela Marques and 'A Terceira Margem do Rio', by Guimarães Rosa

Abstract

The function of the "father" in the patriarchal family would be to represent the fundamental law: prohibitions considered necessary for the very constitution of the subject and of civilization. In view of the representations of this "paternal function" in the narratives of the short stories Hora de dormir, by Santiago Villela Marques and A terceira margem do rio, by João Guimarães Rosa, we intend to analyze both comparatively. It is interesting to note at the outset that both writers present regionalism in their works capable of putting in check the modern project of Brazilian civilization. Even if Rosa is canonical par excellence and Marques is still undergoing a process of recognition by the critic, the comparative analysis between the two texts can be considered pertinent and enriching for the literary studies. In this sense, it is pertinent to realize that the father's "monstrosity" in Rosa's tale would be closely linked to silence, to the abandonment of culture and to its binary logic incapable of giving satisfactory existential meaning to the members of this patriarchal family. This "monstrosity" would bring the family to an unacceptable moment of culture, that is, animalistic, since the patriarch would be much closer to the state of nature. In Marques's tale, the father's "monstrosity" would reside much more in the fact of making indiscriminate and irascible use of physical violence not to promote such a well-being or well-functioning family institution according to pre-determined precepts, but to point out his hierarchical position before the object condition of the mother and son Danilo. In this sense, the figure of the father is presented as someone who, despite representing socially the rule, the law and the structuring order of the patriarchal family, would promote the opposite, that is, its disruption and instability. In Rosa's narrative, this culture is also problematized, but in a more enigmatic and silent way. If in Marques's tale "civilization" would be irreversibly deformed due to the violent character of the father, in the Rosean text social institutions would fail to decode, classify, and control the patriarch's act, being also irreversibly questioned and emptied of meaning. Thus, in both texts patriarchal civilization finds itself bankrupt in its capacity to signify the world and to manage social relations satisfactorily.

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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.22409/gragoata.2018n47a1172