Machado de Assis: A Life in Literature
The Yale International Seminar “Machado de Assis: A Life in Literature” brought together students, researchers, writers, and translators from four universities in Brazil, three in Europe, and five in the United States on October 10-11, 2025. I am very grateful to Élide Valarini Oliver, herself a respected Machado scholar, for generously agreeing to publish the studies from the Yale International Seminar in the prestigious series Santa Barbara Portuguese Studies as a special number.
The Yale International Seminar “Machado de Assis: A Life in Literature” celebrates the prolific author of Rio de Janeiro, founder of the Brazilian Academy of Letters, who dedicated his life to reading and literary composition. In light of his vast production nine novels, 226 short stories, plays, essays, three volumes of poetry, more than 40 years of journalism – we may say that Machado lived in literature. For the invention of character-narrators who substitute the author, the use of citations from a world library, manipulation of retrospective narration and subtle social comedy, Machado has been deservedly recognized as an inventor of the modern novel, as well as a fine and ironic observer of humanity.
The twenty presentations at Yale represent critical approaches to Machado’s diverse writings, whether in genres of narrative prose, poetry, theater, criticism, journalism, or correspondence. Author João Almino of the Brazilian Academy of Letters contributed the keynote address, “O que interrogar Machado hoje?” (“What to ask Machado about today?), opening a contemporary dialogue with Machado on the relationship between reason and madness, one of his major themes from an age of confidence in the progress of science and the logic of the machine. This collection also includes essays by two Yale undergraduate students in my seminar on Machado’s late novels during Spring term 2026
I am especially grateful to the executive committee of Sonia Netto Salomão, José Luis Jobim de Salles Fonseca and Hélio de Seixas Guimarães for their generous collaboration in planning the Seminar and to the contributors, the Edward J. and Dorothy Clarke Kempf Memorial fund, the Whitney and Betty MacMillan Center for International and Area Studies at Yale, the Malcolm Batchelor Fund for Portuguese in the Department of Spanish & Portuguese, and the Yale Council on Latin American and Iberian Studies.
Kenneth David Jackson
Guest Editor
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Kenneth David Jackson
Professor
Yale University
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Editor
| Élide Valarini Oliver Professor of Brazilian and Comparative Literature Director of the Center for Portuguese Studies UC Santa Barbara |
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Assistant Editor
| Pedro Craveiro, Ph.D. Lecturer of Spanish and Portuguese UC Santa Barbara pedrocraveiro@ucsb.edu |
Volume 18
O que interrogar hoje Machado de Assis, João Almino (Academia Brasileira de Letras)
Womanhood and the male imagination in Machado de Assis, Laura Binenbojm (Yale University)
"Un viex pays". A recepção das 'Flores do Mal', de Baudelaire, por Machado de Assis, Sarah Burnautzki (Heidelberg University)
A presença da escravidão em Machado de Assis, Eduardo F. Coutinho (Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro)
The hideous gaze, Paul Dixon (Purdue University)
The reception of Machado de Assis in the United States, Earl E. Fitz (Vanderbilt University)
Laughter in the dark: Posthumous narration as narrative conceit in 'Memórias Póstumas de Brás Cubas' and 'Il Fu Mattia Pascal', Yomi Folaranmi (Harvard University)
Black, white and gray in 'Memórias Póstumas de Brás Cubas', Fernanda Gasparini (Universidade de São Paulo)
Os paratextos na composição de Machado de Assis como autor mundial, Hélio de Seixas Guimarães (Universidade de São Paulo)
Traduzindo 'Memorial de Aires' de Machado de Assis para o alemão e o inglês: Os paratextos, Válmi Hatje-Faggion (Universidade de Brasília)
Machado e a biblioteca mundial: Citação e referência no período formativo, Kenneth David Jackson (Yale University)
Taunay and Machado de Assis: On naturalization and immigration, José Luís Jobim (Universidade Federal Fluminense)
Retratos da alma: O papel da fotografia na construção narrativa de Machado de Assis, Rogério Lima (Universidade de Brasília/UFF/FAPERJ/CNPq)
Itinerancy and identity in 'Quincas Borba', Laurie Lomask (Borough of Manhattan Community College (CUNY)
Machado, liberal: A reading of ‘Instinto de nacionalidade’, Eviatar Oren (Yale University)
Notes on late style in Henry James and Machado de Assis, Craig Osterbrock (Yale University)
O 'Memorial de Aires' entre o circunstancial e o eterno: Máscaras machadianas, Sonia Netto Salomão (Sapienza Universidade de Roma)
Crédito do adiamento: Promessa, suspensão e a economia moral do tempo em Machado, Arthur Starling (Yale University)
Do Rio a Benarés: Machado de Assis e Premchand entre marginalização, ética e estética comparada, Anil Kumar Yadav (University of Delhi)
Machado de Assis personagem, Regina Zilberman (UFRGS; FAPERJ/UFF; UEMA; CNPq)
Propriedade e dispersão na publicação de 'Dom Casmurro': Direitos autorais e o caso de José de Alencar, Fernando Borsato dos Santos (Universidade de São Paulo)