Dialog Between Machado de Assis’s Short Stories and his Theatrical Criticism

The article comments on the ideas that Machado de Assis expresses in his criticism of Brazilian dramaturgy, highlights the importance he attributes to this form of artistic expression and confirms, based on the analysis of narrative texts, that he transfers his experience as a playwright, evaluator, and critic of plays to the space of fiction. From this perspective, the article focuses on the dialog with dramaturgy that is present in “The fortune-teller” and which manifests itself in the compositional resources of the narrative process, as well as in the denunciation of procedures dictated by falsehood, which order social life like a spectacle. The article concludes that when Machado returned in 1884 to the theme of adultery, which was present in his own texts and in the dramaturgy of the 1850s and 1860s, he developed it from a new conception, attributing the cause of the lovers' unhappiness to belief and naivety. This conception reflects on the one hand, the writer’s assessment of the social context, and, on the other, promotes the moralizing purpose he gives to art.

KEYWORDS:
Machado de Assis; dramaturgy; “The fortune-teller”; social criticism