CULTURAL HERITAGE OF A PEOPLE – LITERATURE FROM THERE TO HERE AND FROM HERE TO THERE

Time has erased the footprints of the past, preserving memories that have been safeguarded and revitalized (or reinvented) by around two million descendants of the Azorean pioneers who arrived in the 18th century. Today, the people of Santa Catarina are certainly much more aware and knowledgeable about the history of their ancestors, who originated from an archipelago of nine volcanic islands in the middle of the North Atlantic. After all, what do we really know about this cultural heritage? In fact, everything is the result of a long cultural process of assimilation and transformation, a surviving Azorean spirit in new guises, all along the coast of Santa Catarina. Over the centuries, between yesterday and today, we have built a great bridge of convergence, a two-way street for passing on knowledge, emanating wisdom, celebrating traditions, and thinking about tomorrow, promoting a plural and intercultural dialogue with the society that resides on both sides of the Atlantic. To better understand these paths of the sea, I sought out the intangible cultural heritage, the legacy rooted in the literary creation of Santa Catarina, of Azorean character, so present in a generation of writers who are members of the secular Santa Catarina Academy of Letters (and not only), our oldest cultural and literary institution, with an exceptional history spanning 104 years since its foundation and which had, among its founders, descendants of those Azorean settlers who arrived here 276 years ago.

The historical and cultural imagination of the Azores’ island world has remained with us and is still alive today. Voices that have broken through centuries of cultural history through their writing and art. The founder himself, José Arthur Boiteux, and his brother, Lucas, were descendants of Manuel Jacques and Catarina S. José, natives of the parish of Agualva, Terceira Island. Among the founders with ancestors in the islands of Pico, Faial, São Jorge, and Terceira are: Othon da Gama Lobo d’Eça, Marcelino Antônio Dutra, Altino Corsino da Silva Flores, Antônio Mâncio da Costa, Francisco Gonçalves da Silva Barreiros Filho, Heitor Pinto da Luz e Silva, Luiz Osvaldo Ferreira de Mello, Nereu de Oliveira Ramos, Oscar Rosas Ribeiro de Almeida, Adolfo Konder, Virgílio Várzea, and Arnaldo Claro de São Thiago. All, without exception, have Azorean blood running through their veins. The “wizard” Franklin Cascaes (1908-1983), in his only published work, O Fantástico na Ilha de Santa Catarina (The Fantastic on the Island of Santa Catarina, vol. 1, 1979, vol. 2, 1992), where witches, sorcerers, werewolves, boitatás, and benzedeiras leap from the pages, recorded the magical universe that permeates the social fabric of the Azorean people of Santa Catarina Island.Voices from a still recent past, such as the Grupo Sul – formed by the irreverent modernists (and for many anarchists) Valmor Cardoso da Silva, Aníbal Nunes Pires, Salim Miguel, and Eglê Malheiros and their closeness to the Azorean writer Pedro da Silveira, a native of Ilha das Flores. A multifaceted intellectual, poet, and passionate historian, particularly in the field of literary history, Pedro da Silveira exchanged intense correspondence with the people of Santa Catarina, even publishing in the late 1940s in Revista Sul, edited by the group above, according to Portuguese writer and researcher Vasco Rosa.

It was certainly his anarchist ideological leanings that brought him closer to the islanders of Santa Catarina. I have no difficulty in labeling the writing produced in the green-belly territory as “Santa Catarina literature.” This literature has one of the greatest names in Symbolism – the poet Cruz e Sousa, who is represented in the national contemporary scene by names with a consolidated and recognized body of work: Lindolfo Bell, Rodrigo de Haro, Salim Miguel, Cristovão Tezza, Dalton Trevisan, Godofredo Oliveira Neto, Flávio José Cardozo, Nereu Corrêa de Souza, Maura de Sena Pereira, Péricles Prade, Amílcar Neves, and Sérgio da Costa Ramos. Finally, I sought “in the bridges between the islands of the sea and the islands of the land on both sides of the ocean, now increasingly Atlantic,” as Onésimo Almeida puts it in O Peso do Hífen (2010, p. 207), the intertextualities in literary writings. I was surprised by how much our imagination is continually enriched by knowledge of the Azores.

I often write about the cultural convergence between literature born in the Azores or created by Azoreans, wherever they may be, and the literature of Santa Catarina, from the mid-19th century to the first decades of the 21st century, capturing new and immense perspectives on literary creation in this era of unrest, political and social turmoil, and uncertainty.I cannot fail to highlight the voices of different stories, thoughts, and generations traveling the paths of the sea—Vitorino Nemésio, Pedro da Silveira, Natália Correia, Eduíno de Jesus, Fernando Aires, João Pedro Porto, Urbano Bettencourt, Onésimo Teotónio Almeida, Ivo Machado, Joel Neto, Adelaide Freitas, Marco- lino Candeias, Álamo de Oliveira, Dias de Melo, Cristovão Aguiar, João de Melo, José Medeiros Ferreira, Diniz Borges, Vamberto Freitas, Vitor Rui Dores, Nuno Costa Santos, Angela Almeida, Paula Lima, Pedro Maia, José Andrade, Aníbal C. Pires. LÉLIA PEREIRA NUNES A literary production that, from a handful of islands in the middle of the Atlantic, also becomes universal, just by “singing” them. Urbano Bettencourt, in O Amanhã Não Existe (Tomorrow Does Not Exist), with his incisive and sharp prose, draws the reader into the literature of a people and their vision of the world beyond the sea that embraces them, in the lands of emigration. The attentive scholar Vasco Rosa suggests a profound debate on culture in the Azores; I go further and dare to suggest that this “profound debate” should encompass all communities of the Azorean diaspora and traverse the paths of the sea in both directions: from here to there and from there to here. In the article “A cultura dos engomados” (The culture of the ironers), published in Diário dos Açores on November 15, 2023, journalist Osvaldo Cabral emphasizes that cultural policy is not a matter for the government but for the state—it promotes identity both inside and outside the country. I also miss the interculturality that emerged in colloquiums, meetings, and conferences, showcasing a rich intellectual life and unparalleled creativity. I didn’t want to end it yet… Because the future is dawning!

Therefore, I want the secrets of the islands in the whispers of the many Azorean voices from the Islands and around the world, safeguarded in the fascinating universe of books and even kept in a single copy, such as the magnificent A Açorianidade no Tempo, bringing together 263 authors in 29,694 pages, by Nova Gráfica, a project conceived by the brilliant Ernesto Rezendes, visionary director of Nova Gráfica—forty-two years printing memories, dreams, and ideas, stories, and innovating with art and beauty. Today, more than ever, I agree with Urbano Bettencourt, who understands the islander as a man on a rock, surrounded by worlds, imagined and concrete, on all sides. And without feeling that they should apologize for it to anyone. Because these are the true Azoreans of the Islands and of the World – they are on the shore here as we are there, proud of our heritage.

2024

This is from the Book Casa do Tempo, by Lélia Pereira Nunes. We will be featuring the beauty of Lélia’s essays in English translation by Diniz Borges, here in Filamentos.

Translated to English as a community outreach program from the Portuguese Beyond Borders Institute (PBBI) and the Modern and Classical Languages and Literatures Department (MCLL) as part of Bruma Publications at California State University, Fresno, PBBI thanks the Luso-American Education Foundation for their support.