A escrita das águas em Manoel de Barros

Abstract

In this dissertation we analyzed Manoel de Barros’s poetry, selecting a corpus of poems thematize the water, taken from the work Arranjos para assobio (2007a), Menino do mato (2010a), O guardador de águas (2009a), Poeminhas pescados numa fala de João (2001a) and Livro das ignorãças (2007c). We proceeded with a semiotic analysis of the illustrations that accompanied some poems, aiming to broaden the comprehension of the corpus. We structured the chapters in the perspective of “aquatic symbolism”, according to the theory of Northrop Frye (2013), to study what, in the manoelinos verses, we noticed as a sort of imitation of the cycle of waters – from the origins to the torrential rains and the river’s formation. In the whole of the work, we put the archetype symbol – the water – unifying the chapters and, inside each poem, the ‘conflict’ provoked by the existential situations of the poet, presented by the deranged syntax, by the semantic displacement or by the altered rhythm. Therefore, we show that, in the expression of the waters, a mystic poetry is inscribed, the cycle of the water does not finish, but it always returns to the origin, considering that it has the power to generate lives and to renew them.