The Alienist and Other Stories of Nineteenth-Century Brazil (4 page)

After swearing at the agent and changing his mind several times about what to do next, Gonçalves decided that the best plan was to go straight to the fellow’s house armed with his walking cane, tell him a thing or two, and give him a thrashing if he answered back. It was an energetic and immediate response, a fairly easy one, and (his heart said) it would set an example for the ages.

“Don’t bother me, scoundrel, or I’ll smash your face!”

Agitated and tremulous, he dressed in a hurry and, wonder of wonders, didn’t even put on a necktie until, halfway down the stairs, he noticed its absence and went back to choose one. He brandished his walking cane in the air like a sword to see if it was ready for action. It was.

“Take that, you scoundrel!”

He apparently then delivered several loud blows to the chairs and floorboards, provoking a shout from an irritable neighbor. Finally, he left, his twenty fervent years boiling in his veins, incapable of swallowing the insult and disguising his annoyance.

Once outside, Gonçalves passed the Ocean Walk, Our Lady of Perpetual Help Street, and Goldsmith Street. He went all the way to Ouvidor Street, and it occurred to him he could go that way to the agent’s house. So he took Ouvidor, but he didn’t turn to look at fellows who waved at him there, or even at the pretty girls who were out for a walk. Like a charging bull, he looked neither left nor right. Someone called his name.

“Gonçalves! Gonçalves!”

He charged ahead as if he hadn’t heard. The voice came from the open front of a café. The caller called again, then emerged and grabbed him by the shoulder.

“Where are you going?”

“I’ll be right back—”

“Come here for a moment.”

And he pulled Gonçalves by the arm into the café where three other young men were sitting at a table. They were his classmates, all the same age as he. They asked where he was going. “To punish an uppity scoundrel,” replied Gonçalves, by which his four friends knew that his target was neither church nor state, but, rather, someone to whom he owed money or, very probably, a rival. One of them went so far as to say that he should leave Brito alone.

“What about Brito?”

“What about him? What about Brito, the chosen one, the big man with the mustache, whom Chiquinha Coelho liked better than you? Or don’t you remember Chiquinha anymore?”

With a shrug, Gonçalves summoned a waiter and ordered a small cup of black, sweet coffee. This wasn’t about Chiquinha, and it wasn’t about Brito. It was about something quite serious. The coffee came, and he rolled a cigarette while one of his friends confessed that Chiquinha was the prettiest girl that he’d seen since coming to Rio de Janeiro. Gonçalves said nothing. He smoked his cigarette, drank his coffee in small, slow sips, and gazed into the street. Then he interrupted his friends to declare that Chiquinha was pretty, but not the prettiest, and he cited five or six others. Some of his friends agreed entirely, some partly, and some not at all. Chiquinha, the incomparable. Various analyses. A lengthy debate.

“More coffee,” ordered Gonçalves.

“Some cognac?”

They drank coffee and cognac. One of the beauties that they were talking about passed by, at that point, strolling down Ouvidor Street on the arm of her father, a deputy in the National Assembly. The father’s appearance turned the debate in a political direction. He was about to be named head of an imperial ministry.

“A minister, imagine! And Gonçalves his future son-in-law!”

“Quit joking around,” laughed Gonçalves.

“What’s the matter?”

“I don’t like jokes. Me, a son-in-law? Anyway, you know my political views. There is a huge gap between us. In politics, I am a radical.”

“Yes, but radicals also marry,” observed one of his friends.

“They marry radical beauties,” added another.

“Exactly, radical beauties.”

“She’s beautiful, but radical?”

“This coffee is cold!” exclaimed Gonçalves. “Hey, another coffee! Somebody have a cigarette? Me, a radical, the future son-in-law of an imperial minister? That’s a good one! Haven’t you read Aristotle?”
¹

“I haven’t.”

“Me, neither.”

“They say he’s good.”

“Excellent,” insisted Gonçalves. “Hey, Lamego, do you remember that fellow who wanted a costume for the masked ball, and we put that hat on him and said that his costume was Aristotle?”

And he told the story, which really was funny, and everyone laughed, starting with Gonçalves himself, in long belly laughs. The waiter brought his second coffee, which he found hot enough but too scant, and he asked for a third cup and another cigarette. One of his classmates then told a similar story, and when he happened to mention Wagner, the conversation turned suddenly to music and the Wagnerian revolution underway in Europe. From there, the conversation naturally turned to modern science, to Darwin, Spencer, and all the other big names, and between one thing and another—here a serious note, there a lighthearted one, here a cigarette, there a coffee, and lots of general hilarity—they were surprised to hear a clock strike five.

“Five o’clock!” said two or three of them at once.

“In my stomach it feels more like seven o’clock,” considered another.

“Where do you fellows eat supper?”

They decided to pool their funds and eat together. They scraped together six milréis and went to a modest hotel where they ate well and kept the bill in mind. It was half past six o’clock when they stepped outside, dusk on a beautiful summer evening. They walked toward São Francisco Square. They saw some girls still out on Ouvidor Street, only a few stragglers, though, and more girls at the São Cristóvão streetcar stop. One of these really got their attention. She was tall, good-looking, and recently widowed. Gonçalves thought that she looked a lot like Chiquinha Coelho, but the others disagreed. Whether she resembled Chiquinha or not, Gonçalves got excited and proposed that all of them get on whatever streetcar she did. His friends just laughed.

Night was really falling by that time, and they went back to Ouvidor Street. At half past seven, they headed for a theater, not to see the show, because they had only cigarettes and a stray coin or two in their pockets, but to watch the fine ladies arrive. An hour later we could find them at Rocio Square, discussing physics. Then they recited poetry, both well-known works and verses of their own. Next there were more funny stories, puns, horsing around, and general high spirits. Gonçalves was the noisiest and most expansive of all, as if he didn’t have a care in the world. At nine o’clock, he was back on Ouvidor Street, now by himself, and since he was out of smokes, he bought a pack for twenty-two milréis, on credit.

To be twenty years old!

THE EDUCATION OF A POSER

In this story, Machado de Assis goes on the attack, critiquing the emptiness and superficiality of the imperial elite. Here there is no narrator at all. Instead, the reader “overhears” a conversation between a father and a son who has just finished his law degree. The scene is the parlor of a rich family following a dinner party on the young man’s twenty-first birthday. Unsurprisingly, it’s time for a little fatherly advice. The surprise is the shocking character of that advice, in which the father lays out the routine techniques of social and political “theater” that were routinely practiced but seldom talked about so frankly. The father’s praise of empty-headed “posing” is Machado’s humorous way of making a serious point. He believed that his elite readership was superficial, thoughtless, and far too absorbed in self-aggrandizing social games. Here he tells them so—speaking about the men, at least—in laughably clear terms. If the readers of
Gazeta de Notícias
recognized something true about themselves in “
Teoria do medalhão
” when it first appeared in 1881, then Machado had made his point, as usual, with ironic good humor.

“A
re you sleepy?”

“No, sir.”

“Neither am I, so let’s talk a bit. Open the window. What time is it?”

“Eleven o’clock.”

“Our modest dinner this evening went well, no? And so, young man, you’re finally twenty-one years old! Twenty-one years ago today, on the fifth of August, 1854, you first blinked at the light of day, a tiny infant, and now look at you. A man, with quite a mustache! And some experience in love, too—”

“Papa!”

“Relax. Let’s talk man to man. I have some important things to tell you. Close the door and sit down and let’s talk. So … twenty-one years old, a degree, a few financial assets. At this point, you could write for a newspaper, seek a judgeship, run for office. Agriculture, industry, trade—you have an infinity of options. Twenty-one years, my boy, are just the beginning. Napoleon and Pitt were precocious, but even
they
had just begun at the age of twenty-one. But whatever your choice of profession, I want you to be great and illustrious. Notable at the very least. I want to see you rise above obscurity and distinguish yourself from the common throng. Life is an enormous lottery, Janjão. There are a few winners and many losers, and the money of the losers builds the jackpot for the winners. That’s life. We can’t whine or protest the way things are, only accept it, the bad with the good, the burdens with the benefits, and move ahead.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And just as it’s always a good idea to put away something for one’s old age, it’s good to have a fall-back career. One never knows. The first career may fail, provide inadequate compensation, or not fully satisfy one’s ambitions. Such is my advice to you, at any rate, on this great day when you are coming of age.”

“Thank you. But
what
fallback career do you have in mind?”

“No second career is more advantageous, in my opinion, than to be a pure poser. There you have it!”

“A
what
?”

“A poser. To live purely by posing was the dream of my youth. But lacking my own father’s guidance in the matter, I’ve ended up as you see me today … and without a fallback career, I’ve pinned all my hopes on you. So listen, my son. Listen and learn:

“You’re young and have the impulsiveness and exuberance of youth. Don’t fight those qualities, but do moderate them gradually, so that, by forty-five years of age, you can put them aside and adopt an unfailingly steady and upright decorum. The sage who said that ‘gravitas resides in the way you carry yourself’ defined the poser’s art. Be careful, however. Don’t confuse this sort of gravitas with the other sort, which, while expressed in one’s appearance, actually emanates from the spirit. Don’t think deep thoughts. Physical gravitas, strictly physical, is all you seek. As for the age of forty-five—”

“Right, why forty-five?”

“It’s no arbitrary limit, nothing I’ve simply dreamed up, but, rather, the normal timing of the phenomenon. The true poser generally emerges at between forty-five and fifty years of age. Some emerge between fifty-five and sixty, and there are a few precocious cases, who reveal themselves at the age of forty, thirty-five, even thirty years old. Posing is thus generally a gift of age. To pose successfully at twenty-five is the privilege of genius.”

“I understand.”

“Let’s get to the crux of the matter. A successful poser must think carefully about his principles. The best approach is not to be limited by principles at all. Imagine an actor deprived of movement in one arm. He may be so skillful that the audience doesn’t notice his impediment, but it would obviously be better to have the use of both arms. Similarly with principles. One can try to conceal them, but most men are unable to, and the constant struggle is annoying. Better to have none.”

“But who said—”

“Wait. You, my boy, if I’m not mistaken, have the ideal makeup for this noble calling: a perfect mental vacuum. I’m not referring to the frequency with which you simply repeat in one conversation phrases that you have heard in another. I’m referring to the solemnity and fervor with which you pronounce your opinion, pro or con, about the cut of a vest, the size of a hat, or the sound produced by a pair of new boots. Now
that
is a promising sign, indeed, one that speaks volumes. Still, the passage of years may afflict you with a few ideas of your own, so be constantly on guard. Principles can arise suddenly and treacherously. The public has a keen nose for them, and they are severely crippling.”

“Of course … but how can one avoid them totally?”

“It can be done, believe me. Conceptual lucidity is your enemy. Work against it systematically. Handbooks, for example. Read handbooks of rhetoric … oh, and listen to political speeches as often as possible. Parlor games such as cards and dominoes are useful for a poser-in-training, especially when they are played in silence. Silence is the most accentuated form of circumspection, and a poser is nothing if not circumspect. Note, too, that parlor games, which occupy the mind without exercising it, are better than physical activities such as swimming, gymnastics, and horseback riding, which rest the mind and may therefore unintentionally reinvigorate it. Playing billiards, on the other hand, is excellent.”

“But why? Isn’t billiards a physical activity as well?”

“You’re correct in theory, but the facts do not conform to the theory in this case. I urge you to play billiards as much as possible because studies show that habitual billiard players have approximately the same curiosity and opinions as a cue ball.”

“All right, then.”

“Afternoon strolls, especially if done strictly as a fashionable amusement, are likewise highly recommended. Be careful not to take walks unaccompanied, however, because solitude becomes a workshop for ideas. When the spirit is left to itself, even in a crowd, mental activity may result.”

“But what if I don’t have a friend nearby to walk with me?”

“No problem. You can always go to one of those public places where idle fellows gather to pass the time. Many go, to bookshops, but, for a reason that escapes me, lingering in bookshops does not seem to be the best way to avoid ideas. Don’t get me wrong. All serious posers should appear in a bookshop from time to time. Just make it quick. Go in to discuss the latest local rumors and scandals, who has said what about whom, you know, and possibly to inquire who has read the latest issue of
Revue des Deux Mondes
. Everyone who has read it will express exactly the same opinions, and monotonous repetition is helpful in reducing mental activity. With a little self-discipline, in eight or ten months—two years at the outside—one can curb the most prodigious intellect and reduce it to quiet, dignified, common sense. I’ve said nothing about language, but it should be obvious. A simple vocabulary will do most of the time.”