Mário de Andrade in Brazil and in La Plata River: Translation in the Reconfiguration of Crônica as a Genre

Abstract

This paper analyzes the "poeticity", according to Antonio Candido (1980), of the Brazilian chronicle since 1930. The change of direction is examined through the translation of several Mario de Andrade´s “crônicas”, Crónicas de melancolíaeufórica (ALTER, 2016), and its insertion in contemporary Uruguay. In this way, the translation, seen from the point of view of the genres it puts in contact, allows a dialogue between two traditions in which the term “crônica/crónica” does not mean exactly the same. As a result, I propose a reading of Mário de Andrade with Lima Barreto, another relationship that Candido raises, and also with two relatively contemporary chroniclers of Andrade, but from the Spanish domain: Argentinians Roberto Arltand AlfonsinaStorni. Finally, I aim to draw comparative lines and break points for the evolution of the “crônica/crónica” in Rio de la Plata and in Brazil in the last decades, when the term starts to refer to different texts in aesthetic terms and different critical approaches arise.