By DENILSON BOTELHO*
It is only possible to understand Lima Barreto's militancy by contextualizing it within the political and ideological conflicts in which the writer intended to participate.
“From the ordeal and drunkenness of this great suburban, urban, Brazilian and universal pendant, it is possible to extract so much that it embarrasses me. All I can say is that the younger generations of Brazilians are missing out on a lot by not knowing the creator of men who knew Javanese, of people who reflected – without false faces – a suburban Rio that is still forgotten today, as it was then; of a small-time Rio de Janeiro native who has perhaps never been heard of again – with such vigor, coherence, passion and humanism – in the literature of this country. Everything about Afonso Henriques de Lima Barreto is there, alive, jumping, in the streets, moving, incredibly without a solution, […] years after his death. In the bare, raw, Tupiniquim way in which the mulatto captured this Rio de Janeiro, Brazilian, South American life.” (João Antônio, Calvary and porres of the Afonso Henriques de Lima Barreto pendant, P. 14).
If we could travel back in time to Rio de Janeiro at the beginning of the century, we would have the wonderful opportunity to witness the emergence of Brazilian popular music. In fact, since the 78th century, different musical genres such as polka, waltz and tango had been “Brazilianized” by musicians from Rio, giving rise to musical styles with typically local rhythms – such as samba and choro. These were new rhythms that were joined by themes from the beginning of the century, as was the case with a political satire song from the revue theater, originally recorded by Discos Phoenix, which competed in the nascent recording market of the time with the legendary Casa Edison of Rio de Janeiro, the first company to record 1902 rpm records, founded in XNUMX.
Famine, considered a humorous song, is a song by an unknown author, recorded in 1914 by Aristarcho Dias, author of the lyrics, and actress Arminda Santos. The original interpretation of the time, portrays the difficult times experienced in Rio de Janeiro in the 1910s. In just over two minutes, the performers play an engaged couple who, in three verses and a chorus, tell the drama that gives the song its title and, certainly, was experienced by the majority of the Brazilian population in those years.
In the opening verse, the singer warns: “Maricota, we can’t get married anymore, oh no!”, and then explains that “the price of beans has gone up so much, and even more so the price of porridge”. In short, “Everything has gone up, dried meat, meat and beans / Everything has gone up, everything is going up, everything will go up / Fresh meat, my love, already costs ten tostões”. Faced with such high prices, the chorus reveals the only solution perceived by the lyricist: “Waiting for the crisis to pass / is better for our love / what a disaster, I’ve never seen / I’ve felt, I’ve felt”.[1]
The chronically high cost of living imposed countless difficulties and precarious living conditions on a large part of the Brazilian population in the first decades of the 20th century. The postponement of the wedding between Maricota and her fiancé served as the theme for the song and demonstrated the irreverence with which this serious economic and social problem could be commented on.
In the field of literature, Lima Barreto (whose death was 102 years ago this November 1st) also put his finger on this sore spot: “The various parts of our very complicated government have been working to study and overcome the causes of the growing cost of basic necessities in our lives. The strikes that have broken out in various parts of the country have greatly contributed to these steps by the State. However, life continues to get more expensive and no measures are being taken.”[2]
The Brazilian economy during the First Republic was truly going through a critical period. The urban working classes noticed this in their daily lives, especially through the frequent increases in food prices. The 1910s were particularly painful for the pockets of the lower social classes, as the Great War would worsen the problems that had been accumulating since the end of the XNUMXth century.
As in the imperial period, agriculture continued to be the main sector of the economy in the first republican decades, given that in 1920 it was found that 66,7% of the country's economically active population was engaged in this activity.[3] This predominance coincides with the persistence of a highly concentrated land ownership structure. Faced with the lack of liquidity and credit that marked the end of the 19th century, the government sought a way to finance agriculture and adopted a policy of expanding domestic credit and issuing currency, backed by loans taken out abroad.
Thus, at least twice, in 1898 and 1914, the country was on the brink of financial collapse, having been saved by the signing of agreements with external creditors, the so-called Funding Loans. On these occasions, the National Treasury was able to refinance its debts, agreeing to pay off old loans with new loans and high interest rates. The creditors and the names given to the agreements changed, but the practice became recurrent during the republican period.
At the same time, the governments of the First Republic were still trying to accommodate the interests of coffee producers, who had seen the price and exports of the product plummet on the foreign market over the years. Trying to ignore the law of supply and demand, the producers met in Taubaté in 1906 to implement a failed policy of increasing and sustaining the price of coffee, which consisted of reducing the supply of the product and the exchange rate.
The reduction in the supply of coffee would be achieved by removing part of this product from the market, which in turn would be made possible by purchases financed by external loans. Due to the resistance of international banks, fearful of Brazil's financial situation, these loans would be provided by international traders directly linked to the coffee trade. This last fact has led part of the historiography to emphasize that the greatest beneficiaries of the policies to increase the value of coffee were international traders and bankers, with farmers only coming second. In any case, the fact is that such policies were, in fact, paid for by society as a whole (particularly by the working classes).[4]
While coffee proved to be a profitable and interesting product, farmers and merchants were the first to profit from it. From the moment it lost value, the loss was “democratically” shared by society as a whole, with a substantial part of it being reserved for the working classes.
Inflation and widespread high prices were added to this context of growing foreign debt. Demand for food products grew in war-torn Europe and, consequently, supply on the domestic market decreased, further contributing to the rise in the prices of these products. Once again, the bill ended up in the pockets of the less fortunate, who suffered an ever-increasing degradation of their living conditions. As the song from the musical revue goes: “Everything went up, everything goes up, everything will go up”…
In view of this, there was Lima Barreto protesting on the pages ofThe Debate, which began to circulate in the second half of July 1917, under the direction of Adolpho Porto and Astrojildo Pereira. His writings allow us to assess how all this was experienced in the daily life of the Federal Capital. It was at Pereira's invitation that the writer came to collaborate in this 16-page newspaper, sold for 100 réis every Thursday. Perhaps this was the periodical in which the writer felt most comfortable and free to express his opinions, after his own magazine, the Floreal.
This is what can be assumed from the words of Porto and Pereira, announcing their objectives: “The program of this newspaper, it can be said, is contained in its own title – the debate. In fact, the main purpose that moved us to organize it was to create a debate body, whose columns, (…) open up to the discussion of the most interesting problems of the present day, in politics, economics, literature, the arts… Addressing the most varied subjects, facing the most serious issues head on, sustaining passionate campaigns – in short, stirring up public opinion and reflecting its actions and reactions in the debate, as we wish, it will be a burning, warm, impetuous leaf.”
“(…) Without political or social connections of any kind, the debate arising from this urgent need will always have its pages entirely dedicated to the great causes of collective and individual freedoms, unfailingly guided by a broad ideal of justice and equity”.[5]
This proposal summarizes the ideals of the press desired by the militant writer: the confrontation of the most serious issues of the moment, with the purpose of stirring public opinion, combined with the possibility of writing autonomously and independently, without ties to any political currents. In this sense, it is important to note that, also in 1917, the writer cherished the dream of having his own magazine. This time it would be called marginalia and your “program” would be similar to that of Floreal ten years before and the d'The Debate.
Although the magazine was never more than a project, we can imagine what it would be like based on what was written in the writer's diary: "Having noticed that articles by certain of our authors, when they appear in widespread publications, are read with interest and avidity; and also noting that many writers cannot write them with independence and the necessary intellectual autonomy, so as not to hurt the interests and susceptibilities of the big companies in our daily lives, magazines and magazines; we decided to publish a small biweekly magazine that would include articles of a similar nature and where, without depending on petty interests of the moment, broad and frank comments on the successes of our activity could also be made, in all those departments where our collaborators felt they needed to find a subject”.
“(…) What we want is to clarify facts and opinions, under the light of free criticism, so that those readers, little immersed in the backstage of certain aspects of our lives and only having before them the raw facts, can better judge the unfolding of political, literary and other events, as well as the individuals involved in these events”.[6]
The aforementioned program also contains a paragraph revealing the identity that the writer himself intended to give to the magazine: “With this spirit, we decided to put Mr. Lima Barreto, a young author, in charge of the publication’s intellectual direction, whose books, which are very well known, are guarantors of the direction that he will give to marginalia, according to what we desire.”[7]
Editing a new magazine would be like reliving the times of Floreal ten years later and, therefore, in a very different situation. Firstly, because at the head of this new publication would be a more mature and experienced writer, at 37 years of age, unlike the impetuous and little-known young man of 27, who was still seeking to enter the literary scene of the Federal Capital. Furthermore, this life experience, which included published books and stints at several periodicals of the time, would certainly lead him to give this magazine a much more openly militant character for the causes he defended.
If the marginalia did not reach the streets, Lima Barreto will then have n'The Debate the opportunity to exercise his critical militancy with autonomy and independence in the company of other collaborators, such as Agripino Nazareth, Domingos de Castro Lopes, Domingos Ribeiro Filho, Fabio Luz, Georgino Avelino, Gustavo Santiago, José Félix, José Oiticica, Luis Moraes, Manuel Duarte, Mauricio de Lacerda, Max de Vasconcellos, Pedro do Coutto, Robespierre Trovão, Sarandy Raposo, Santos Maia, Theo-Filho, Theodoro de Albuquerque and Theodoro Magalhães.
In this group, some names already sound familiar and identifying them represents the possibility of getting to know the social network in which the writer moved. After all, they are his companions and interlocutors in the pages of a newspaper that appeared at the height of the effervescence of the workers' movement in the 1910s. Domingos Ribeiro Filho was a colleague in the public office of Lima Barreto and an anarchist who also participated in the Floreal.
Astrojildo Pereira gives us a profile of his personality when he tells us how he met him: “I met him in 1910, when he was Renato Alvim’s main collaborator in the weekly newspaper ‘A Estação Teatral’. Small in stature, very ugly, with a curved nose, Domingos Ribeiro Filho quickly became the central figure in any group, thanks to the charm of a spirit that was constantly shining. He was in fact an admirable conservative, and he wrote as he spoke, with the same abundance and the same charm. His sayings, his epigrams, his devastating sarcasms followed one another and multiplied with an absolutely astonishing vivacity. But it was not only because of his irreverent spirit or his wasteful talent as a writer that he exerted such fascination. Domingos was also the best of comrades, very cordial with his friends, always full of care and tenderness towards his companions, and therein lay the secret of the faithful friendships that he maintained until the last days of his life.”
“I remember well the long afternoons we spent around it, in the old Café Jeremias […] or in the old Papagaio on Rua Gonçalves Dias. I was the youngest in the group, and also the shyest, listening much more than speaking, but I am sure that it was there that I learned best to laugh with optimism and to feel how good the joy of living really is”.[8]
In his judgment years later, in the 1940s, Astrojildo considered Domingos an “admirable conservative”. However, we do not know exactly in what aspects the anarchist Domingos was a conservative, in his comrade’s opinion. In any case, this is an indication that different followers of this libertarian doctrine could have taken shelter under the umbrella of anarchism.
José Oiticica was an intellectual who closely followed the developments of the Russian Revolution. So much so that, in early 1920, he wrote in Voice of the People, a series of articles entitled “Bad Path”, expressing his discontent with the direction of the Russian revolution.[9] This daily newspaper was founded – in 1920 – by the Workers' Federation and had “its own workshops and a team of editors recruited from among those who were active in the forefront of the workers' movement and had real leadership qualities”[10]. With successive editions seized and with police officers permanently monitoring the vicinity of the editorial office, this periodical in which Oiticica was active ended up having its graphic designers and editors arrested and stopped circulating: “it was not stuffed, but strangled”.[11]
Oiticica and Fábio Luz, together with Lima Barreto, made up a group of intellectuals who worked inThe Debate. Oiticica was a literary critic, philosopher and poet who studied Law and Medicine. He declared himself an anarchist with his own independent ideas.[12] Fábio Luz, a hygienist from Rio de Janeiro and also an anarchist, wrote some novels with libertarian content that had repercussions in working-class cultural circles: Ideologist (1903) The emancipated (1906) Elias Barrao e Xica Maria (1915) Virgin mother, Sergio e Chloé (1910)[13]
The Debate It also had a short life and featured Mauricio de Lacerda in its pages, who had a political career and was the rapporteur of the first Labor Code, in addition to having campaigned in the defense of labor rights, women's civil rights and the right to strike, thus providing important support to the workers' movement at the beginning of the century.
The Debate It became significant in Lima Barreto's career because it clearly and didactically expressed his political and social criticism, as he did regarding the high cost of living in that edition of September 15, 1917.
Not allowing himself to be entangled by far-fetched arguments and calculations that are difficult to understand, he explains: “There is no need to be too immersed in the mysteries of commercial and industrial rascality to see the cause of such an increase in the price of essential utilities for our existence. Never has Brazil produced so much of them and they have never been so expensive. The farmer and the agricultural worker continue to earn the same; but the consumer is paying double. Who wins? The capitalist. He and only he, because the tax authorities themselves continue to receive the same or almost the same amount as before.”[14]
The First World War and the Russian Revolution, as well as the worsening of the economic crisis the country was going through, seemed to demand from Lima Barreto a more effective engagement in the political and social struggles of that moment and this was reflected in his time in The Debate. What we can increasingly observe in his articles and chronicles published from 1916 and 1917 onwards is an increasing inclination towards the socialist ideas that were widespread at the time. Unfortunately, this newspaper, like so many others, also had a short lifespan and did not even survive the end of the war. However, it was in this newspaper that he published some of his most scathing criticisms of the political, economic and social situation in the country in 1917.
In that year, Brazil was governed by President Venceslau Brás, who was dealing with the consequences of the Great War that had begun in 1914 and, internally, was administering a country in crisis. If, until the beginning of the great world conflict in Europe, Brazil imported the vast majority of the manufactured products it consumed, from that point onwards, there was a significant increase in national industry. “Suddenly, everything was in short supply and Brazil had to produce. The precarious industrial park that had been dragging on since the beginning of the Republic took a leap forward”.[15] This leap can be measured by the growth in the percentage of the Brazilian population considered as “industrial workers” in official censuses. At the beginning of the Republic, in 1889, only 0,4% of the population fell into this segment, representing around 54 thousand workers. In 1919, shortly after the War, this percentage reached 1% of the population, or around 275 thousand workers.[16]
The country, where agriculture had been the main economic activity until then, saw an increasing number of workers employed in industry enter the large urban centers. It was during the war years that the proletariat surpassed the 200.000 mark, reaching a total of 1920 workers in the 293.673 census. This segment of the population faced harsh living and working conditions: low wages, long working days of 10 to 12 hours a day, children and women receiving even lower wages, and, in addition, food prices were constantly rising, which made the high cost of living unbearable.
In these moments of crisis, a dynamic was established that “could only be maintained at the cost of overexploitation of the working masses, through the fall in real wages, the rise in unemployment, with the consequent rise in the cost of living, shortages of basic goods and hunger. One of these crises that most affected the living conditions of workers was the one that emerged at the end of the First World War. In a price survey carried out by the carpenter Marques da Costa, in Rio de Janeiro, while the cost of living, considering only basic items, had increased by 189% – in the period 1914-23 –, the average professional salary had increased by only 71%, in the same period, meaning a drop of almost two thirds in the real value of wages”.[17]
According to Foot Hardman and Victor Leonardi, one of the most complete surveys on the growing impoverishment of proletarian families at that time was carried out by Hélio Negro and Edgard Leuenroth, showing that “the concrete situation of working-class life was more serious than these statistics suggested.”[18]. Let's see: "Fifty percent of heads of families in the cities and countryside of Brazil earn salaries that vary between $80 and $000. A family composed of a husband, wife and two children, spending only what is strictly necessary, needs at least $120, as we demonstrate below."
[…] Summary:
Food……………………..………………………89$000
Accommodation……………………………………………..45$000
Other needs…………………………………$32
Clothing, footwear and other necessities….40$000
Total……………………………………………………207$000
As you can see, these expenses do not include any entertainment, drinks, tram, electricity, children's education, absolutely nothing that goes beyond what is strictly necessary for the lives of 4 human beings.
A meager and inferior quality diet was calculated, and only for four people, despite the fact that workers' families were generally larger.
We also assume that the head of the family works from the first to the last day of the year, although we know that there are forced stoppages due to illness, unemployment, strikes, etc.”[19]
Living in the distant suburb of Todos os Santos – a suburb he once described as the “refuge of the unfortunate”[20] –, being a frequent user of the Central do Brasil trains and supporting his family with the meager salary of a clerk at the Ministry of War, Lima Barreto not only lived closely with the part of the population that suffered most from the crisis and the high cost of living, but also felt first-hand the difficulties imposed by a material life full of limitations.
This permanent coexistence with the common people often appears in the pages of his literature. However, in the articles and chronicles he published in the press, it takes on a non-fictional tone. The writer persistently questions the origin of so much inequality imposed on society and protests against this state of affairs. In the periodicals he worked for, we can see in more detail how the crisis the country was going through and the ideas linked to the Russian Revolution were reflected in his writings.
In 1918, the pages of Bras Cubas, for example, express the writer's fury against a certain representative of the firm Zamith, Meireles & Cia, called only Franco, who goes to the Commercial Association of Rio de Janeiro – “a nest of evil hoarders” – to lobby against a possible regulation on the export of sugar and defend that the same product be exported for less than half the price for which it is sold on the domestic market.[21]
In a direct message to those who “want to get rich off the misery of others,” Lima Barreto observes and warns: “If you are or have gotten rich off sugar, you do not know how much pain, suffering, and blood the machinery used to manufacture sugar in your factories has cost. (…) The companies in São Paulo, Matarazzo and others, Martinelli, here, and several others that I do not wish to mention, have made fabulous profits, without this having resulted in improvements for the workers who serve them.”
“This Mr. Franco says that if exports are regulated, tens of thousands of individuals will go into poverty. I ask you now: what have they gained from the fabulous dividends that you have had? Wages have not increased, while all the utilities necessary for life are always rising in price. (…) I simply want to tell you to be careful; that it is not possible to abuse the patience of all of us, not only of the workers whom I do not flatter, but of the petty bourgeois like me, who have received more education than all the 'Francos' and do not tolerate these insults of tyrant, tyrant of commerce, of usury, of piracy with which you want to plunder the world.”[22]
The article above records the profound imbalance affecting prices and wages in Brazil, at a time when the first news of what had happened in Russia began to reach the country. Although in this text the writer does not even address the subject of the revolution, we will see that it is the state of misery into which a large part of the population is progressively sinking that awakens his defense of a revolution capable of reversing the situation prevailing at the time. That is why he warns, in a threatening tone, to the capitalists: “be careful!”
It should also be noted that Lima Barreto calls himself a petite bourgeois, because in addition to his public employment and his own home in the suburb of Todos os Santos, this condition is associated with his level of education. Despite all the difficulties he faces, the debts that weigh on his shoulders on several occasions, his culture and intellectual life make him an avowed petite bourgeois.
On the other hand, he makes a point of making his stance towards the workers clear, emphasizing that he does not include himself among their occasional flatterers, but merely defends positions that he considers fair from his point of view. Although he assumes his status as a petty bourgeois, he does not hesitate to recognize the legitimacy of the demands of the workers who are being sacrificed by high prices and low wages.
The inaugural edition ofThe Debate contained an article entitled “The Russian Revolution”, written by Astrojildo Pereira, which shows a certain harmony with Lima Barreto. Even admitting that a “movement of such magnitude and complexity, stirred by a thousand different currents, must necessarily manifest itself in confusion and contradiction, with highs and lows, with violent lights and darks”, the columnist and editor of the newspaper bet on the victory of the “socialist and anarchist proletariat”.[23] In fact, the section maintained by Astrojildo to deal with external affairs will always have space reserved to inform the reader about events in Russia.
Furthermore, an article signed by J. Gonçalves da Silva and entitled “Cork regime for workers”[24], which condemns the repressive brutality of police chief Aurelino Leal and sides with the striking workers, highlights the path chosen by the newspaper, which went against the grain of others, such as the father, for example – one of the most conservative bodies of the period.[25]
In fact, Astrojildo would feel the repression unleashed by Aurelino Leal firsthand, spending just over two months in prison (between November 18, 1918 and January 26, 1919). A hymn attributed to him dates from this period and whose inspirational motto would have been the figure of the Chief of Police.
This “pearl” lies among the documents in his private archive:
Oh your doctor Aurelino,
Worthy chief of police;
I want to weave a hymn to you here
Of admiration and respect.
– I'm serious, without malice,
Both hands placed on the chest…
“Within these five months,
which go from August to the current date,
I have been arrested twice,
For joy and revenge
Yours and more of the good people
From the Security Corps
“Ah! I imagine what joy
You must give them prison
From those who, like me, didn't miss
No opportunity
From below a dog's ass
Give them dignity!
“It's true I'm trapped here,
between these bars placed,
exposed to the chufa and contempt
of his latrine men
that make a big fuss
of the hunt for libertarians
“Hundreds of incarcerated,
In Detention and Central,
There are also, as far as I know, footprints
Due to reason
Similar to the one by which
I find myself here captive
“We purge everyone, of course,
This enormous crime:
To strive, chest uncovered,
For the rights of the people,
Against this world that oppresses you
For the sake of another new world.
“We are all criminals
From the same damned idea
Who wants to disturb the pleasures
Of the current ruling caste,
Of this voracious limited company
That you keep, arrogant.
“Now then
Well, I'll use it the most.
I'll use it, your boss, of the most
Frankness, here in this letter:
If the Major's candor
In time, we wouldn't be caught
(I'm not lying, damn me!)
Before this year is over,
“All the illustrious bourgeoisie
Of our plutocracy
I would be dethroned,
Reduced to refuse,
Defeated by Anarchy,
Beaten for Work!
“It would be a huge coup,
that had to be dismantled
This arrogance and this trunk
That adorn its qualities:
And here in this place
You would be, between bars
And now in my place
“Well, your boss, here I tell you
Loudly and publicly,
On enemy's word:
In this clumsy case
You have shown amply
He really is a fit guy
“He attacked us, fierce and hard
To us other anarchists,
Getting us into trouble,
Under the saber of Public Order:
Something never seen before between us
Since the Republic exists
In the annals of this
“Of the workers on the back
The swordfish snored;
And the strike, from fall to fall,
He crumbled into impotence;
And in the end you won
This is yet another benefaction.
“Women were beaten,
Defenseless old men, little ones…
People of various mysteries
Who cried out for more bread
For the unhappy mouths…
And you: stick and machete!
“What does it matter if hunger prevails?
In the homes of the proletarians?
It's better not to change
Good sleep to the plunderers,
Thieves and more hitmen
From the upper ruling classes…
For all this, praises
You deserve it, your boss.
– Of the future among the rumors
Your name must be heard:
'Aurelino – Butcher,
Worse than the plague and famine!'”[26]
The director's “anthem”The Debate reveals not only the persecution suffered by its author, but also denounces the situation experienced by the workers. It also serves as testimony to the consequences of the strikes that occurred in 1918, in Rio de Janeiro.
Actually The Debate It is a genuinely militant newspaper with regard to the workers' movement. Its editions are dominated by articles and materials with political content, with special emphasis on coverage of the strikes that are spreading not only throughout Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, but also throughout the rest of the country, and even neighboring countries, such as Argentina.[27] This is a newspaper driven by concerns about the living conditions of the poorest sections of the population, particularly workers. For this reason, in each issue it discusses the problem of high prices and expresses great enthusiasm for the events taking place in Russia at the time, even identifying signs of the formation of workers' and soldiers' committees here in Brazil, following the example of what was happening in that country.[28]. This enthusiasm is certainly shared by its employees.
Consequently, there was no issue of this newspaper that missed the opportunity to hit Venceslau Brás' government hard, criticizing it on a variety of grounds. In addition, the newspaper opened up space for controversial issues, such as the debate about women's suffrage and women's political participation in Brazilian society, or the importance of the Judiciary and justice in a period so frequently shaken by the successive declaration of states of siege.
It is in the pages ofThe Debate that Maurício de Lacerda defends the right of women to enter the political scene as voters and candidates, while Fabio Luz argues in the opposite direction, as he sees the transformative role of women within the family and in the upbringing and education of children.[29] It is also in the pages of this weekly that the need for a judiciary less compromised with the excesses of the executive branch and more willing to enforce the rights guaranteed by the Constitution is discussed at length, at a time when workers are persecuted and expelled from the country in violation of the law, and when a police chief like Aurelino Leal is setting an example throughout the country with the countless arbitrary acts he commits in repressing the workers' movement and strikes.
This newspaper, where a cartoon by Fritz almost always takes up the entire space on the title page, satirically announcing the critical content of the following pages, makes room for some significant texts by Lima Barreto, especially regarding the theme of high prices. By attributing the rise in the cost of living to capitalists and, consequently, to capitalism, the writer proposes a path to be followed.
In fact, the foundation on which Lima Barreto formulates his thoughts and ideas seems to be the experience and observation of the daily reality with which he lives. Anarchism or maximalism never presented itself as a mere intellectual whim. The hard experience of a life full of financial difficulties and living with the rabble of the suburbs, who also suffer due to the high cost of living, serves as the basis for his reflections, for the choices he makes and the proposals he formulates. In that turbulent time that was 1917, it was above all the high cost of living that drove him to publicly defend the right to strike and led him to view the Revolution underway in Russia with increasing sympathy.
This is certainly why he directs all his indignation against the capitalists who speculate here with the prices of sugar, beans, green meat and other products. Here is the proposed path: “In their presence, I should act as if I were in the presence of a robber who tracks me down in a deserted place and demands the nickels I have in my pocket. There is only one remedy, if I do not want to be left without my meager pennies: it is to kill him. There is no need, however, to do so, in the part related to these sugar cynics and others. Such people do not mind dying: they mind losing money, or not earning it. If you touch their purse, they cry like weaned calves. The people have until now waited for repressive laws due to such a scandalous restriction (…). They will not come, rest assured; but there is still a remedy: it is violence.”
“Only through violence have the oppressed been able to free themselves from an oppressive, greedy and cynical minority; and, unfortunately, the cycle of violence has not yet been closed. (…) Our republic, following the example of São Paulo, has become the domain of a fierce syndicate of greedy money-grubbers, who can only be fought with weapons in hand. From them come all the authorities; from them come the major newspapers; from them come graces and privileges; and over the nation they have woven a narrow-meshed net, through which only what suits them can pass. There is only one remedy: to tear the net with a knife, without regard to moral, religious, philosophical, doctrinal considerations, or any other kind of consideration.”[30]
Concern about the cost of living is not a monopoly of Lima Barreto. In a way, much of the press covered the issue that was of enormous appeal at that time, but the major newspapers would never give space to someone who wanted to come forward and propose “tearing the net with a knife”, “fighting with weapons in hand” or the bitter “medicine” of violence. In the very The Debate, the problem is closely monitored and, in the month before the publication of this article by Lima Barreto, it took up four consecutive pages of the newspaper with the report of a Commission of Municipal Intendants of the Federal District, responsible for studying and seeking solutions to the high prices of basic necessities.[31]
By following Lima Barreto's work in the various newspapers and magazines in which he wrote, as well as the interlocutors with whom he debated his ideas, it is possible to weave his political profile. After those first years of almost "anonymity" and the search for literary recognition, which would only come with the publication of his Memories of the clerk Isaias Caminha, we can identify an intermediate phase of approximation and enchantment with the anarchist ideas and movement.
A period marked by the conquest of new spaces in the press of the time and by the increasing involvement with the political issues of the 1910s. And we can also observe that from 1916 and 1917 his presence in several small newspapers and magazines intensified, through which he would exercise his literary militancy, becoming increasingly an intellectual engaged in the political struggle for changes that would lead Brazil to experience a revolution along the lines of the one that had occurred in Russia in 1917, that is, of a socialist nature.
However, it is important to emphasize that, although he had explicitly adhered to the maximalist ideals that so fascinated him at the time, Lima Barreto never accepted affiliation with any political doctrine. Throughout his short life and as a literary activist, he insisted on his freedom of thought and opinion and, above all, his autonomy and independence, and refused to join any political groups or currents.
The pages of the ABC., for example, give us testimony of this choice: “I do not know who said that Life is made by Death. It is the continuous and perennial destruction that makes life. In this respect, however, I want to believe that death deserves greater praise. (…) Life cannot be a pain, a humiliation of idiotic office boys and bureaucrats; life must be a victory. However, when this cannot be achieved, death must come to our aid.”
“The mental and moral cowardice of Brazil does not allow for independence movements; it only wants followers of the procession, who only seek profits or salaries in their opinions. There is no field among us for great battles of spirit and intelligence. Everything here is done with money and titles. The agitation of an idea does not resonate with the masses and when they know that it is a question of opposing a powerful person, they treat the agitator as crazy. (…) What is necessary, therefore, is that everyone respects the opinion of everyone, so that from this clash arises the clarification of our destiny, for the happiness of the human species itself.”
“However, in Brazil, this is not what they want. They try to stifle opinions so that only the desires of the powerful and arrogant can be heard. (…) In this way, those who, like me, were born poor and do not want to give up a single line of their independence of spirit and intelligence, only have to praise Death.”[32]
Above we have one of several articles in which the writer reaffirms his independent status, overcoming his undeniable maximalist militancy, despite his disenchantment with the country and the feeling of defeat. Strangely, this 1918 article pays homage to the death that would prematurely take him out of combat four years later.
Given part of the trajectory followed by Lima Barreto in the Rio de Janeiro press at the beginning of the 20th century, in which we sought to identify some of the interlocutors with whom he maintained dialogues, how can we define him politically?
Rather than considering it as contradictory or independent, given the imprecision with which it develops its arguments, it is worth noting that within the workers' movement itself there is also a great deal of imprecision. According to Claudio Batalha, despite the classical analyses of the trade union movement in Rio de Janeiro pointing to a supposed hegemony of anarchism before 1930, what we see is the existence of a mosaic of tendencies and ideologies, which reproduce the different positions of the workers' movement in Europe.[33]
The fact is that the anarchist influence of direct action is notorious among the supporters of direct action, which was dominant in the workers' movement during the First Republic, although they were a minority in Rio de Janeiro. Among the principles they defended were the rejection of intermediaries in conflicts between workers and employers; the condemnation of party organization and parliamentary politics; the prohibition of paid employees in unions; the adoption of collegiate and non-hierarchical leadership; the disapproval of assistance services in unions; the refusal to fight for partial gains; and the defense of strikes as the main form of struggle, pointing to a general strike. These principles were present in the resolutions of the workers' congresses held in 1906, 1913 and 1920.[34]
All currents of international anarchism are sheltered under the umbrella of revolutionary or direct action syndicalism. As Claudio Batalha points out, there is a certain “ideological confusion”[35] in the nascent Brazilian workers' movement.
The yellow or reformist groups, a less influential group – although more visible in the capital, mainly among port workers and the transport sector – and an adversary of the previous group, defend political conceptions about the functioning of unions that were shared by socialists of different shades, positivists and pragmatic unionists.
Among the principles they defended, the following stand out: the need for lasting, strong and financially solid organizations to achieve their objectives; the mutualist nature, as a way of guaranteeing the permanence of members, paying their monthly dues; the strike as a last resort, never as an end in itself, since what mattered was obtaining gains, even if partial; that the demands were mediated by lawyers, politicians and authorities; the consolidation of gains through laws, since any achievement obtained could be temporary; and participation in official politics and the presentation of workers' candidates for legislative elections.[36]
Amidst the many different ideological currents that compete for space in society and, particularly, in the workers' movement, highlighting Lima Barreto's anarchism or socialism may mean very little. After all, if we have seen the writer sometimes defend direct action, often rejecting official channels and means of conducting popular and workers' demands, in an attitude that would supposedly be in line with some currents of anarchism; we have also seen him value parliament, political programs to the detriment of the names that are put forward, elections and formal means of doing politics so much to the taste of currents linked to socialists, for example.
By removing the writer from the historical and political context in which he lived, his ideas may appear somewhat incoherent or contradictory, but inserted into the “ideological confusion” – pointed out by Claudio Batalha – that characterizes the period, it becomes possible to understand the meaning of his political-literary militancy.
It should be noted once again that we are dealing with a militancy that developed within the scope of newspapers and magazines, confined to the limits of the world of letters of the Old Republic. Lima Barreto was never a worker or even a union activist. His approach to the political issues under discussion in the arena of the workers' movement occurred through his collaboration with the press, in which his texts should be taken as events that move history, and not as a mere representation of the past.
As Todorov notes, “ideas alone do not make history; social and economic forces also act; but ideas are not merely a passive effect. They first make actions possible; then they allow them to be accepted: they are, after all, decisive acts. If I did not believe this, why would I have written this text, whose aim is also to act on behavior?”[37]
As far as ideological affiliation is concerned, everything leads us to believe that Lima Barreto does not act in a unique way or very different from the conduct of the political leaders of the workers' movement. The history of the Brazilian trade union movement during the First Republic is above all the history of its leaders, who make their points of view prevail much more than their programs or the precepts of the political-ideological doctrine to which they are affiliated.[38].
It is no wonder that the PCB's cadres, when it was founded in 1922, surprisingly came, for the most part, from anarchist militants (who rejected the party path) and not from socialism, as happened in the rest of the world.[39]
Therefore, it is only possible to understand Lima Barreto's activism by contextualizing it within the political and ideological conflicts in which the writer intended to participate. It is a political behavior guided by the eclecticism so common at that time, although the writer does not fail to recognize that, in certain circumstances, the only option left was to "tear the net with a knife!"
*Denilson Botelho is a professor of Brazilian History at the Federal University of São Paulo (Unifesp). Author of the book The homeland I wanted to have was a myth (Prisms). [https://amzn.to/3ApC1FG]
Notes
[1] Brief information about the context of music production at the beginning of the century and music Famine were extracted from the text by Professor Samuel Araújo, PhD in Ethnomusicology, a subject he teaches at the UFRJ School of Music, included on the CD Rio de Janeiro 1842-1920 / Uma trilha musical, produced by the Moreira Salles Institute.
[2] BARRETO, A. H. de Lima. “On the high cost of living” in O Debate, Rio de Janeiro, September 15, 1917. Or in: Marginália. São Paulo: Brasiliense, 1956. pp. 191-194.
[3] FRAGOSO, João Luís. “The Slave Empire and the Republic of the Planters” In: LINHARES, Maria Yedda L. (Coord.). General History of Brazil. Rio de Janeiro: Campus, 1990. p. 167.
[4]Ibidem. p. 167. The meeting of coffee producers that took place in 1906 became known as the Taubaté Agreement.
[5] PORTO, Adolpho and PEREIRA, Astrojildo. In: The Debate, Rio de Janeiro, July 12, 1917, p. 4.
[6] BARRETO, A.H. de Lima. Personal Diary. p. 1956-193.
[7] Ibid.
[8] PEREIRA, Astrojildo. “Domingos Ribeiro Filho” in Tribuna Popular, 15/7/1945.
[9] BANDEIRA, Moniz and others. The Red Year. São Paulo: Brasiliense, 1980, p. 256
[10] SODRÉ, NW The history of the press in Brazil. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira, 1966. p. 368
[11] Ibid. p. 368.
[12] DULLES, John W. Foster. Anarchists and Communists in Brazil. Rio de Janeiro: Nova Fronteira, 1977. p. 35. In a historiographical review of the workers’ movement, Batalha notes that this book by Dulles is one of the examples of the crop of Brazilian scholars who have studied the subject. However, he is a historian with a conservative political position, whose book brings together a large volume of information and little analysis of his own. Here we make use precisely of this vast volume of information made available by Dulles. See BATALHA, Claudio H. de Moraes. “The historiography of the working class in Brazil: trajectory and trends” in FREITAS, Marcos Cezar (Org.). Brazilian historiography in perspective. São Paulo: Contexto, 2000. p. 150.
[13] HARDMAN, Foot and LEONARDI, Victor. History of industry and work in Brazil (from its origins to the 20s). São Paulo: Ática, 1991, p. 258.
[14] BARRETO, A. H. de Lima. “On the high cost of living” in O Debate, Rio de Janeiro, September 15, 1917. Or in: Marginália. São Paulo: Brasiliense, 1956. pp. 191-194.
[15] BANDEIRA, Moniz, CLOVIS, Melo and ANDRADE, AT The Red Year; the Russian Revolution and its repercussions in Brazil. São Paulo: Brasiliense, 1980. p. 48.
[16] HARDMAN, Foot and LEONARDI, Victor. History of industry and labor in Brazil (from its origins to the 20s). São Paulo: Ática, 1991. p. 146. See also: ADDOR, Carlos Augusto. The anarchist insurrection in Rio de Janeiro. Rio de Janeiro: Dois Pontos Editora Ltda., 1986. pp. 33-133.
[17] HARDMAN, F. and LEONARDI, V. Op. Cit. p. 156.
[18] Ibid. p. 157.
[19] NEGRO, Hélio and LEUENROTH, Edgard. What is maximalism or Bolshevism? São Paulo: Editora Semente, sd This book was first published in São Paulo in 1919.
[20] BARRETO, AH of Lima. Clara of the Angels. New York: Routledge, 1956.
[21] BARRETO, A. H. de Lima. “The Franco…” in Urban Life. (Originally published in Brás Cubas, on 1956-143-144).
[22] Ibid.
[23] The Debate, Year I, No. 1, July 12, 1917. p. 12.
[24] The Debate, Year I, nº1, July 12, 1917. p. 7-8.
[25] This polarization is frequently reaffirmed. Already in the second issue from The Debate, an unsigned article names João de Souza Lage, owner from The Country, of a “crook” who “daily distils objurgatory syphilitic pus”. The confrontation is due to the interpretation that João Lage gives to the strike movement underway in São Paulo. “When even the capitalists do not hesitate to recognize the justice of the workers’ complaints (…), it is admirable that Lage should attribute to pernicious foreigners the formulation of very just complaints, which he (…) considers to be the impertinence of those expelled from other lands”. O Debate, Year I, nº2, July 19, 1917. p. 10.
[26] The 16-stanza hymn in “praise” of Aurelino Leal, Chief of Police, dated December 16, 1918, is unsigned but is attributed to Astrojildo Pereira. This is its full transcription, respecting the way it was originally written. See Astrojildo Pereira Archive, Doc. PP1P6, in the Edgard Leuenroth Archive, Unicamp.
[27] Coverage of the strikes beyond the Rio-São Paulo axis can be seen in the edition of O Debate, Year I, No. 10, September 15, 1917, p. 11, where a photograph takes up half the page, recording a rally held in Salvador, and below the photo the caption reads: “A photographic certificate of what was the last strike in Bahia”. In the edition of September 29, 1917 (Year I, No. 12), the article entitled “The strikes in Argentina” is also accompanied by a photo of a rally held in Buenos Aires.
[28] The newspaper follows the signs of the formation of workers' and soldiers' committees in Brazil from the July 26, 1917 edition (Year I, No. 3), in which the article entitled “The example of Russia – Serious revelations of an army soldier – Will we also have a Soldiers' and Workers' Committee?” appears on page 7.
[29] See O Debate, Year I, No. 1, July 12, 1917, p. 3, article by Maurício de Lacerda entitled “Women’s Votes”. See also O Debate, Year I, No. 4, August 2, 1917, p. 3, article by Fabio Luz entitled “Feminism”.
[30] BARRETO, AH de Lima. “On the high cost of living” in O Debate, Rio de Janeiro, September 15, 1917. Or in: Marginália. São Paulo: Brasiliense, 1956. p. 192-194.
[31] O Debate, Year I, No. 7, August 23, 1917, pp. 12-15: “Municipal Council – Report read at the session on the 6th of this month of the work of the committee responsible for studying the causes of the increase in the price of food”.
[32] BARRETO, AH de Lima. “In Praise of Death” in ABC., Rio de Janeiro, October 19, 1918. See also: Marginalia. São Paulo: Brasiliense, 1956. pp. 42-3.
[33] BATALHA, Claudio H. de Moraes. “Yellow” syndicalistism in Rio de Janeiro (1906-1930). Doctoral dissertations from the University of Paris I. Paris: 1986, p. 164. An abridged version of the thesis was recently published in Brazil: The workers' movement in the First Republic. Rio de Janeiro: Jorge Zahar Editor, 2000. On the historiography, which includes classical analyses, of the workers' movement see: BATALHA, Claudio H. de Moraes. “The historiography of the working class in Brazil: trajectory and trends” in FREITAS, Marcos Cezar (Org.). Brazilian historiography in perspective. São Paulo: Contexto, 2000.
[34] Ibidem. pp. 164-184. Or: BATALHA, Claudio H. de Moraes. The workers' movement in the First Republic. Rio de Janeiro: Jorge Zahar Editor, 2000. p. 29.
[35] Ibid. p. 166.
[36] Ibidem. pp. 164-184. Or: BATALHA, Claudio H. de Moraes. The workers' movement in the First Republic. Rio de Janeiro: Jorge Zahar Editor, 2000. p. 33.
[37] TODOROV, Tzvetan. Us and the others; the French reflection on human diversity. Rio de Janeiro: Jorge Zahar Editor, 1993. Volume 1. Pp. 14-15.
[38] BATALHA, Claudio HM The “yellow” syndicalism in Rio de Janeiro (1906-1930). These de Doctorat de l'Université de Paris I. Paris: 1986. P. 173.
[39] Ibidem, p. 181.
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