One month ago the Brazilian writer Euclides da Cunha, would complete 150 years old. So this post is a tribute to him. I studied from 5º grade to 8º grade in a school with his name. The first summary was published at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euclides_da_Cunha. The second was published at http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsereviewofbooks/2014/02/22/book-review-the-scramble-for-the-amazon-and-the-lost-paradise-of-euclides-da-cunha/. The third translated by me and it was published http://radios.ebc.com.br/momento-tres/edicao/2016-01/2001-os-150-anos-de-euclides-da-cunh. The fourth was published at http://www.jstor.org/stable/3512701?seq=1#fndtn-page_scan_tab_contents. The fifth was published at http://www.wanderlino.com.br/chronicle/014.htm. The sixth was published at http://www.123helpme.com/view.asp?
Euclides da Cunha (1866-1909) was a journalist, sociologist and engineer. He was born in the town of Cantagalo in the Rio de Janeiro state. He attend the military school and become a member of the Army until 1896, when he was discharged in order to dedicate himself to studying civil engineering. In 1897, he accompanied the Army in the Campanha de Canudos, against a rebellious group of peasants under the leadership of Antonio Conselheiro. Between August and October, he was working as a war correspondent for the O estado de São Paulo Newspaper. In 1903, he was elected to the Academia Brasileira de Letras. In August of 1909 trying to kill a young lieutenant, who was the lover of his wife, but his brother shoots back and thus he was killed. His most important work is, "Os Sertões" (Rebellion in the Backlands), a non-fictional account of the military expeditions promoted by the government against the rebellious village called Canudos. The book was translated by the University of Chigaco Press in 1944. It remains in print. Euclides da Cunha was the basis for the character of the journalist in Mario Vargas Llosa's The War of the End of the World.
Euclides da Cunha's life met a dramatic end. Of precarious health, racked by fever, half-deranged, he confronted his unfaithful wife, Ana and her younger lover, Dilermando. A gun battle ensued with both men shot. While Dilermando survived, Euclides's life ebbed away, as he bled to death from chest wounds. Although writer Euclides da Cunha is a central focus of The Scramble for the Amazon and the Lost paradise of Euclides da Cunha, the work of the UCLA Professor Susanna Hecht as "part biography, part social history, part nature writing, it is a 600-page, detailing a forgotten time of Amazon exploration and compeling imperialisms in the 19th and 20th centuries. Euclides da Cunha was sent to the Amazon to survey and map one of the longest tributaries of the Amazon, the Purus. Appointed by Baron Rio Branco, Euclides was charged with developing the nationalist narrative that would shape Brazil-Bolivia-Peru boundary mediations by unveiling hidden histories of conquest and settlement. Luckly for us, he was also told to describe anything interesting he passed along the way. Euclides saw his survey position as the perfect basis for a new literary work. Provisionally entitled O Paraíso Perdido, he intended it to be a nationalist synthesis of "geography, philosophy, biology and journalism" that would "unveil the Amazon's explorers, spies, natives and brutal geopolitics". Intended also as a companion work to acclaimed "Os Sertões", a non-fictional account of the Brazilian government's military expeditions against the rebellious village Canudos. Canudos was destroyed, but Os Sertões, however, is celebrated not only for its brilliant writing but because of the interesting change in Euclides' authorial voice, "...initially sneeringly superior insisting on inevitable victory of Brazil's coastal civilisation over mestizos backlanders, he increasingly emphasizes with the doomed rebels..."
It was in 1902 that the newspaper, "O Estado de São Paulo published for the first time the sentence: "The backlander is before all a strongman". More than a sentence, a realization that Euclides da Cunha did in a series of articles about the northeast backland. Articles that in the same year become in a classic of the Brazilian literature. In January, 20th exactly 150 years ago, was born Euclides da Cunha. A man ahead of his time, a man who besides a writer, was journalist, sociologist, geographer and civil engineer. His tragic life become book. Euclides died with 43 years old after to have tried to kill the lover of his wife, Ana. Tragedy that still continued with the death of his son, many years after by the same killer.
Euclides da Cunha remains one of the most intriguing figure in Brazilian literary and intellectual history. A man of powerful emotions, Euclides rose above his personal frustations and disappointments to produce a remarkable legacy for those who seek to understand Brazil. Euclides has become the perennial subject of studies seeking to offer a new understanding of the man and his time. Such analysis must inevitably rest upon a careful examination of Euclides' own works. Yet few of his informal writings survive. No diaries have ever been published. Such sources, however meager, are indispensable in revealing the connection between the author and his work. They also tell us much about the atmosphere of the Brazilian time in which Euclides labored and suffered.
Euclides da Cunha, the writer of The Sertões, never surrendered. he was a man of the earth, a humane, but fighting man. He was a scholar and an able cartographer; dissecting the parched, destitute lives of the impoverished in Brazil. An implacable witness of strenght and weakness of the arid land and souls of its inhabitants. He was a magician, hypnotizing us with his words, a explorer of the mysteries and mysticism of Canudos and the spirit of Antonio Conselheiro. Euclides da Cunha was a harsh man belonging to a harsh land. He personified both hope of rain and the despair of implacable droughts. He was the sociologist, the historian, devourer of horizons. He was at the same time, worst enemy of the hated military soldiers and the ally of the desert's rebels. In "The Sertões, the earth is an analysis, a panoramic view of the northeastern region. Canudos is an unkown land, entrance to the forbidden hinterland. a hell of dryness of the land and the men, a secular martyrdom of hunger and ignorance. In the interior of the land, the cowboy. Inside the man in his soul and in his flesh, rest his supertitions. There is slavery, and mystic madness. There exist no adjectives with one can qualify the War of Canudos. Only in Euclides, does the impossible, become reality. Canudos did not surrender. It was struck down while standing. The Sertões of Euclides will never fall, on the contrary, they will live forever!
Rebellion in the Backlands is set in the Northeastern of Bazil. It is basically, a historical narration of a period of time (1896 and 1897) where the government of Brazil decided to wage war against a religious group of about 5000. this group of people, lead by a charismatic leader named Antonio Conselheiro, did not accept the government as their legitimate and was therefore deemed a threat to the rest of the country. The poor, native people proved impressive opposition. Altough, in the end the military did prevail over the people, and they were all killed. Still, the intersting thing about his book is that it seems to demonstrate that there is more to the story than just a battle lost. Thre is a certain hint of bias on the part of Euclides who seems to favor the militaristic actions taken by the Brazilian government, yet showing sympathy and even a bit of admiration towards the native who display great loyalty to their ideals.
