Análise genética do poema Apartment in Leme, Copacabana (jan. 1st) de E. Bishop

Abstract

The present work presents an investigation of the creative process of the poem Apartment in Leme, Copacabana (Jan. 1st) by the North American poet, Elizabeth Bishop (1911-1979), in the light of the concepts of Genetic Criticism and Social Anthropology. It is an interpretative analysis of the referred poem, especially focusing on three documented versions that dialogues with other writings, mainly extracts of Bishop’s correspondence and two chapters of her book Brazil: chapter four, Three Capitals, and six, Unselfconscious Arts. The originals of the poem in question consist of twenty-nine pages of dated and crossed-out drafts in the author's hand, which are in the archives of the Vassar College Special Collection, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York. The poem was published after Elizabeth Bishop's death in the book Edgar Allan Poe & The Juke Box: uncollected poems, drafts, and fragments (2006), edited by Alice Quinn, under the name Apartment in Leme, along with other poems, drafts and fragments from the Elizabeth Bishop archive. This dissertation aimed to make an observation behind the scenes of the chosen poem, especially focusing on issues of Culture and Cultural Shock (Oberg, 1960). Furthermore, Brazilian mythical-religious elements in Bishop’s work were also analyzed, thus enabling new perspectives and considerable developments on a posthumous poem, as well as on the intricate relationship between the northern hemisphere where Bishop came from and the southern Brazilian culture that emerged in the author’s writing.