São Bernado     by Graciliano Ramos, Translated by R.L. Scott-Buccleuch Original title: Sâo Bernado Original language: Portuguese Country: Brazil   Published by Taplinger NY Pub. Place: UK List Price: £10.95 Not available for ordering

Graciliano Ramos was one of a number of North-eastern novelists whose writings in the 1930s and 40s were instrumental in drawing attention to their native region. Paulo Honório, the narrator of São Bernardo (1934), is a ruthless, self-made man who rises from humble origins to achieve his dream of owning a large fazenda (estate) in the North-eastern state of Alagoas. His triumph is characterised by the murder of a rival, a neighbouring landowner named Mendonça, and yet Ramos portrays Paulo Honório as the product of his environment, a society pervaded by endemic corruption, where only the strong survive. Despite his tyrannical behaviour, Ramos makes it clear that Paulo Honório is a man whose power and influence is ultimately based on weak foundations, for his total distrust of all around him leads directly to his eventual downfall.

His marriage to Madalena, a poor schoolteacher with a social conscience and an independent spirit, proves to be the prelude to his descent into a fury of self-destructive jealousy, which eventually leads to his wife’s suicide. Paulo Honório’s recognition of his failure to communicate with Madalena, and its contribution to her death, leaves him at the novel’s conclusion largely abandoned by friends and family, consumed by self-loathing and regret as he contemplates a lonely end to his embittered life.

Ramos’ unsentimental, powerful novel is driven along by a compressed, urgent style that mirrors the terse, impatient nature of its narrator. With references to the political turbulence which accompanied the rise to power of dictator Getúlio Vargas in 1930, Ramos draws a vivid picture of a conservative, rural Northeast, symbolised by the character of Paulo Honório, who is unwilling or unable to come to terms with changing times.

Next day, Saturday, I killed the sheep for the voters. Sunday evening, as he was returning from the election, Mendonça was shot in the chest and bit the dust there and then, on the road close to Bom-Sucesso. Today the spot is marked by a cross with one of its arms missing. At the time of the murder I was in town talking to the parish priest about the church I intended to build in S. Bernardo. In the future, that is, provided business progressed satisfactorily.

‘How terrible!’ said Father Silvestre when they brought the news. ‘Did he have any enemies?’

‘Enemies! Did he have any enemies! As thick as lice. Well, what about it, Father Silvestre? How much did you say a bell costs?’ 30-31