Globalização, técnica e modernidade no Rio de Janeiro das primeiras três décadas do século XX

Abstract

While a considerable amount of scholarship in the field of historiography has been devoted to the transformation of the urban landscape of Rio de Janeiro in the early 20th century and literary studies have largely focused on the representations of the city by major authors of this period, until now research on the literary treatment of the changing city by foreigners remains scarce. The purpose of this paper is to introduce and problematize how travelers writing in English reflected the new realities of Rio de Janeiro during the First Republic by relating a corpus of selected travelogues to the literary works of Brazilian authors Machado de Assis, João do Rio, and Lima Barreto. By focusing on the concepts of speed, acceleration, globalization, and modernity, I propose to unpack the underlying tensions that accompany the far-reaching changes that occurred as a consequence of the urban reformation promoted by Mayor Francisco Pereira Passos. To do so, following a critical review of the historical context leading to the scenes of urban transformation, this text reflects on three central leitmotifs of travel writing in the city, and analyses them against selected canonical literary texts: the introduction of foreign technology (especially urban railroads) and its impacts; the links between urban transformation and the reproduction of images of the city (with an emphasis on cinema); and the topic of accidents and progress as a problematic idea. The conclusions of the present essay point towards a deep mutual implication between the foreign gazes and the development of the imaginary of a cosmopolitan city, suggesting a correlation between social change, literary representations, and the creation of a corpus of travel writing centered on the city of Rio. Uma baleia, uma telenovela, um alaúde, um trem? Uma arara? Mas era ao mesmo tempo bela e banguela a Guanabara. Caetano Veloso, “Estrangeiro,” 1989