‘An Invincible Memory’ is a 1980s novel by the Brazilian writer João Ubaldo Ribeiro. Spanning over 150 years in its main action, it tells a story of several families from the region of Bahía. As many Latin-American novels, it isn’t only a ‘moving family saga’ with ‘epic scenes’, for it is more thought-provoking than just moving, and it is more ironical than epic. I read it in four days, and it captivated my mind so much that it occurred to me that recognisable or not, this is a novel that deserves to be written about. It’s so complex, so exquisite, so meaningful, with so many important tropes that I couldn’t be indifferent to it.
On the social level, it’s a story about colonisation, slavery, exploitation, resistance, whitepassing, internalised racism, dictatorship, and war. In the first chapter, we are presented with the useless death of a young soldier who would be considered a hero on the basis of nationalist mythology. In the first chapters overall, we read about people who are worse than unlikeable. They are mean, cruel, and ruthless, such as the sadistic baron and his mixed-race scribe, Amleto Ferreira. They exploit enslaved people who don’t have many options for escape. But one of them, Vêve, assaulted by the baron, is reluctantly “given” freedom and finds shelter in the house of Leleu, a freed Black entrepreneur. Leleu helps her raise her daughter, María da Fé, who’ll become a true fighter for freedom. Many years later, she meets Patricio Macário, a young soldier unaware of his blackness and born into the now rich family of Amleto Ferreira. Their relationship seems to be the first genuine and consensual relation in the novel, and, in a way, these two are the centre of the story. They reject whiteness, classism, and colonial supremacy, and each of them tries to figure out what a nation is. If they are sure of one thing (and the author is sure about it as well), they are sure that a nation, the people, isn’t what the state propaganda of rich elites tells you. The people are the forgotten ones, the impoverished, the subaltern. It rings so true throughout the novel, and, honestly, it’s one of the most important messages I’ve encountered in a work of fiction. It’s radical and beautiful, but it isn’t easy.
I’m writing this not to criticise a wide range of authors, from Márquez to Stacey Halls, whose approach to the past, though still critical, has been gentler and more optimistic than Ribeiro’s. Marquez poked fun at the aristocracy and mocked them, just as he introduced tropes of whitepassing and intermarriage in well-to-do families. You have the same in ‘An Invincible Memory’, but what is inspiring at Marquez’s is pessimistic at Ribeiro’s. When Márquez wrote about Bolívar, it was by no means flattering or uncritical, but it was a sympathetic retelling all the same. When Márquez wrote about the well-born doctor Urbino, he painted him as, more or less, a good guy. If he wrote about ‘bad’ aristocrats’, they were mean and exploiting others (Fernanda del Carpio). Do you see the pattern? Many European authors of historical fiction also deal with class tensions through creating ‘good’ and ‘bad’ rich (Stacey Halls). Ribeiro doesn’t care about supposedly ‘good’ rich. The only good rich is Patricio Macário, and he rejects his social position. And guess what? It works.
There is no understanding between the exploiters and the exploited because it isn’t possible. A whitepassing mixed-race man posing as the illegitimate son of a British aristocrat doesn’t understand a Black fisherwoman. Neither his descendants, except Patricio Macário, will ever understand the poor and their plight. The elites in Ribeiro’s novel live in self-denial and self-contempt for their heritage (yes, even the Portuguese one, because, as one of the characters claims, Brazil should have been colonised by a more ‘advanced’ nation, such as the Dutch or the English). Their rampant classism and white supremacy aren’t far from fascism, and neither is ideology far from Amercian and English racism. It’s a difficult topic, just as it is difficult to admit that a person rejecting their heritage to get rich, the way Amleto Ferreira does in the novel, isn’t an example of black excellence but of internalised racism.
There are other elements in the novel that may look controversial at first but, eventually, make sense. For example, the author uses racial slurs… Because he has to. Most of the story is set in the 1800s, and in some cases, it’s useful to show which characters are more racist than others through the language they use. It also shows how and why one’s skin colour was perceived back then and why certain biases have persisted. Another question is violence. There is a description of rape, and there are descriptions of flogging and brutal fights. But those fragments are there not to demean women and other vulnerable people in the gross display of suffering porn. They are there to show us how terrible and violent the social system was and how mean and cruel those ‘patriotic’ and ‘hard-working’ barons and officials were. Are there triggering elements in the novel? They are, but unlike in so many other books, they are included for purpose, not to shock. The best example of purpose is the story of María da Fé and Patricio Macário. María, a rebel leader, is neither fetishized nor sexualized. She isn’t threatened the way her mother was, and her followers respect her just as their commander. When she captures Patricio Macário, the traditional roles are reversed because it’s she who is in charge. However, it won’t be another terrible story of violence, though he is a brash soldier and she is a marginalised woman of colour. She makes him doubt the established order, and he makes her think about love. When they meet for the second time, after several years, they treat each other as equals.
Overall, the themes of ‘An Invincible Memory’ are difficult on many levels, but the reading is rewarding once you’ve read the first part of the novel. The style is original, combining genres and techniques such as fairy-tale, myth, reported speech, and omniscient narration. It may resemble Márquez or Jorge Amado at times, but it isn’t a rip-off. It’s Latin-American magical realism on its own terms. It’s authentic and genuine, and if you haven’t been familiar with Brazilian literature, ‘An Invincible Memory’ would be a good starting point.
Left Hand of Fiction 