Rui Torres precursor of Herberto Helder and Raul Brandão: reimagination in digital poetics

Abstract

Digital literature is one of the fields of contemporary literature, whose texts have, in their elaboration process, digital resources, and hypermedia. The writings characterized as such present innovations in the aesthetic field, as well as preserve, reconfigure and renew modalities of literary making inscribed in tradition. In this perspective, the text Húmus - continuous poem, by Portuguese writer Rui Torres, which, in addition to the various media available in the production of the poem, establishes a dialogue with two previous works: the novel Húmus, by Raul Brandão, published in 1917, and the homonymous poem by Herberto Helder, published in 1967. Then, having in mind Torres' work as our starting point, we aim to reflect on how digital media affect the relationship with printed literary text, whether in the act of creation or reading. We would also like to discuss how to operate the dialogue with the works of the past mentioned above. Our analysis is supported by the studies of intermediality  carried out by Irina Rajewsky and the concept of remediation developed by Bolter & Grusin. Besides, we embrace the idea of palimpsest writing, as formulated by G. Genette, and take into consideration Borges' reflection on the rereading of tradition, understanding that, when appropriating a text, the poet promotes a deviation to the precursor text.