Medo, sertão e cangaço: aspectos da estética gótica em Pedra Bonita, de José Lins do Rego

Abstract

This work, inscribed in the perspective of literary studies, aims to analyze the aspects of Gothic in the regionalist narrative of Pedra Bonita (1938), a novel by the writer José Lins do Rego, which is part of the “Ciclo do Cangaço”, dedicated to the approach and problematization of natural, social and cultural aspects of the northeastern hinterland, among which drought, religious mysticism and cangaço. We will seek to demonstrate, through literary-critical analysis, that the work manifests elements of the aesthetics of fear, with its plot centered on the conflicts of cangaço and of the sebastianist-based messianism. The sertanejo space is described as a locus horribilis, with an inhospitable landscape and uncivilized, bloodthirsty and fanatical inhabitants, being the scene of crimes and barbarism, which brings this work closer to regionalist Brazilian literature and productions based on Gothic aesthetics. For our analysis, we base ourselves on works dedicated to the literature on fear in Brazil, working authors such as França (2015, 2016, 2017, 2020), Hélder Brinate Castro (2016), among others. It is from this analytical perspective, situated on the margins of literary studies more guided by the interest in prose in tune with the standards of neorealism, that we analyze and describe the configurations of Gothic in Brazilian regionalism, highlighting the mistaken erasure of Gothic in the context of production and Brazilian literary criticism.