A invenção da seca no século XIX: a imprensa do norte e o romance Os Retirantes

Abstract

This work consists of analyzing how discourses conveyed by letters published in the newspapers of the northern provinces, from 1877 to 1879, as well as the serial novel, The retreatants, 1879, as literary objects, which appear as shared illusions of supposed reality, forged the construction of the history of drought in the nineteenth century, departing from the weather phenomenon that hit the old north from 1877 to 1879. For this, we analyze how discourses conveyed by letters, as well as the writings on drought by José do Patrocínio, romance and letters published in serials column, pedestal newspaper sometimes determines or modifies genres and even more ways to read, which are decisive for the construction of meaning and interpretation of the reading at any time, from the rhetorical arguments used by readers - writers of these letters, with the intention of establishing the readership with broad receptivity, sensitivity and representation on that backcountry area. We have reflected, analytically, with authors such as Chartier (1991, 1998, 2002, 2007), M. Barbosa (2004, 2010); S. Barbosa (2007, 2010a, 2010b , 2011; 2011a, 2011b), Barthes (1974, 1985) , Freire (1823), Roquette (1860, 1997), among others, who have helped us understand how the heterogeneity of the images raised by these objects merged and created, finally, the dominant discourse of the drought that would be established for the northern region of Brazil.