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Dr. Francia as a "Brasiguaio" in the novel Yo El Supremo? DATASET · AUGUST 2012
1 AUTHOR: Marcos Estrada The University of Warwick 3 PUBLICATIONS 1 CITATION SEE PROFILE
Available from: Marcos Estrada Retrieved on: 24 August 2015
Dr. Francia as a “Brasiguaio” in the novel Yo El Supremo?
Marcos Estrada University of Warwick
[email protected]
The accuracy of the facts in the life of the dictators that ruled in Latin America seems to be rewritten overtime as “the history goes”. First, they used to portray the past in their current days to assure their power, and create a legacy for the future generations. It is known that much of information held during the dictatorships in Latin America no longer exist, they were destroyed or “disappeared”. Thus, much of the facts were lost (and have been reconstructed by the imagination of a few people). Today, historians and sociologists, to mention few in the different groups of people seeking to undercover and understand the past and make sense of the present, are attempting to put the pieces of the puzzle together. The word Brasiguaio has been unchangeably used since 1985 (Sprandel, 1992) to categorize individuals with Brazilian origin residing in Paraguay, both either the group of individuals born in Brazil or their offspring born in Paraguay. The word Brasiguaio (male), or Brasiguaia (female), is the combination of the Portuguese words Brasi(leiro) and (Para)guaio, referring to individuals born in Brazil and Paraguay, respectively. Having the origin of one or both parents as a defining factor of a person’s identity or even the presence of another language, even the dictator Dr. José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia y Velasco (1766 – 1840), or simply “Dr. Francia” as he still be referred until today, can still have his identity and “Paraguayanness” questioned more than a century after his death. Although Dr. Francia is a key figure in the independence of Paraguay and identity, the enigma of his Brazilian origins and its “attributes” are still subject to discussion. Roa Bastos brings in his novel I the Supreme, first published in 1974, an account of Dr. Francia condition as a “bastard of Brazilian origin” presented in the form of a dialogue, diary, notebook notes, and transcriptions of conversations between the Supreme and other people being registered by Policarpo Patiño, the Supreme’s secretary and amanuensis. The novel is a supposedly to be the “re-imagination” of facts in the life of Dr. Francia with fictional portraits. Roa Bastos depicted the authoritarian dream of absolute power played on the borderline between truth and fiction written using existent official records, pronouncements and legal documents from the national archives. It was never contested the well known fact that Dr. Francia had his father from Brazil (Saeger, 2007), as Roa Bastos (1888) put it “son of a foreigner, a parvenu, a Paulista Mameluco”[i] (p.287). But the origin of his parents was and is still open to discussion for those willing to further investigate the matter. As presented in the Yo el Supremo, there was / is an uncertainty about his origin: he is a forainer[ii], a Governor will say of him, though we still do not know whether he is French or Portuguese, Spanish or descendent from the moon, That he is a lunatic no one can doubt, judging from the stigma of notable degeneration in his line of descent[iii] (ibid, p.162)
In this fragment, Roa Bastos puts together different suppositions related to the origin of the Dictator. Yet, he adds up to his statement that ‘nothing is certain regarding these facts appertaining to the origin of and genealogy that the Dictator has done his best to keep hidden until his ascent to Absolute Power’ (ibid, pp. 272-273)[iv]. Additionally, Roa Bastos goes further to explain the artimañas[v] used by the Dictator, which reinforces the supposition that Dr. Francia was a Luso-Brazilian descendent. The elements cleverly used by the Portuguese-Brazilian to compound the confusion and thereby conceal the bastard origins of his adventurous life are the letters of his suppositions names: the Portuguese suffix es changed to the Castilian ez , as it appears in certain documents; the maternal name ( the ç of França, with the little cedilla underneath), very well known among Paulista bandeirantes, has also been Castilianized[vi] (ibid, p.272) Yet, Soares goes further to claim Dr. Francia had both parents from Brazil (Soares, 1973), but he does not provide information to support his claim. A factor that maybe have sufficed at the time to reinforce his “Paraguayanness”, without contestation of his Paraguayan identity was that Dr. Francia had a negative attitude towards Spanish-born landowners and Merchants with power in the economic and political life of the province, Saeger (2007) argues he was ‘a fine example of the frustrated creole [because Dr. Francia hated them]’ (p.21). The novel has its sociological significance, many real historical texts in the footnotes of the book reconstruct the society at the time of the Supreme, taking into consideration the historically significant events and personal memoirs written by Europeans and Paraguayans, the latter triggering claims as the real history of Paraguay. However, Dr. Francia may have or have not been the first Brasiguaio, even not called as such. There is no much evidence. In addition, the term Brasiguaio was only used over a decade after the publication of the book. Yet, to be descendent of a Brazilian citizen will not make or define the Brasiguaio identity of an individual. In order to have the Brasiguaio identity as a genuine social aspect of the region, it is required self-awareness of individuals inside and outside this group of people as a distinct group embracing different characteristics. [i] hijo de un extrangero, de un advenedizo de un mameluco paulista [ii] In the original version it is used the word extrangeros, with intentionally replacing “j” for “g” to make obvious the mix of Portuguese and Spanish languages, or as popularly said a “broken Spanish” symbolising the Brazilian decadency. [iii] Es un extrangero, dirá de él un Gobernador, que aún no sabemos si es portugués o francés, español o lunático. Esto último es lo que nadie puede dudar, a juzgar por los estigmas de notoria degeneración en su descendencia. [iv] Nada consta de cierto acerca de estos hechos que atañen al origen y genealogía que el Dictador ha tratado de mantener ocultos hasta su ascenso al Poder Absoluto. [v] Artimaña refers to tricks or artifice to obtain or conceal something [vi] Los elementos astutamente utilizados por el carioca-lusitano para aumentar la confusión y encubrir con ella los orígenes bastardos de su aventurera vida, son las letras de sus pretensos apellidos: el sufijo portugués es cambiado por el castellano ez, con el que figura en ciertos documentos públicos; en el apellido materno (la ç de França, con virgulilla debajo), muy conocido entre los bandeirantes paulistas, ha sido también castellanizado.
Reference Gasparini, P. (2000). Brasil en "Yo el Supremo" (O de bandeirantes, tamoraés y carnavales de cartón). Hispamérica Año 29 (87), pp.115-126. Roa Bastos, A. A. (1888). I the Supreme. London. Roa Bastos, A. A. (1985). I the supreme. Index on Censorship 14 (6), pp.50-51. Roa Bastos, A. A. (1986). Yo, el Supremo. Biblioteca Ayacucho. Saeger, J. (2007). Francisco Solano López and the Ruination of Paraguay: Honor and Egocentrism. Rowman & Littlefield. Soares, A. (1973). História da Formação das Fronteiras do Brasil. 3rd ed. Coleção Temas brasileiros. [Rio de Janeiro] Conquista: Biblioteca do Exército. Sprandel, M. A. (1992). Identidade e Mobilização: a Luta pela Terra e pelos Direitos de Cidadania na Fronteira Brasil-Paraguai. Etnia y Nación en América Latina II (45).
____________________________________________________________ 1 SPRANDEL, M. A. Identidade e Mobilização: a Luta pela Terra e pelos Direitos de Cidadania na Fronteira Brasil-Paraguai. Etnia y Nación en América Latina, Brasilia, v. II, n. 45, July 1992. 2 SAEGER, J. Francisco Solano López and the Ruination of Paraguay: Honor and Egocentrism. Rowman & Littlefield, 2007. 239 3 ROA BASTOS, A. A. I the Supreme. London: 1888. ISBN 0571148697. 4 SOARES, A. História da Formação das Fronteiras do Brasil. 3rd. [Rio de Janeiro] Conquista: Biblioteca do Exército, 1973. 5 ROA BASTOS, A. A. Yo, el Supremo. Biblioteca Ayacucho, 1986. ISBN 9802760102. 6 GASPARINI, P. Brasil en "Yo el Supremo" (O de bandeirantes, tamoraés y carnavales de cartón). Hispamérica, v. Año 29 n. 87, p. 115-126, 2000. Disponível em: < http://www.jstor.org/stable/20540251 . >. 7 ROA BASTOS, A. A. I the supreme. Index on Censorship, v. 14, n. 6, p. 50-51, 1985.
Marcos Estrada - PhD student in Sociology at University of Warwick, email:
[email protected]
