FEGSESER THE DEVIL TO PAY IN THE BACKLANDSmeans Tie DEVIL TO PAY IN THE BACKLANDS "The Devil in the Street, in the Middle of the Whirlwind” sy JOAO GUIMARAES ROSA Translated from the Portuguese by JAMES L. TAYLOR and HARRIET DE ONS Noret LAS New York Alfred -A-KnopfK pe LC, catalog card number: 6512564 arorrorarer sormeroray Copyright © 1963 by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. [AM rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission in ‘iting from the publisher, except by a reviewer, ‘rho may quote brief passages in a review to be printed in a magazine or newspaper. Manufac- fured in the United States of America, and dis- taibuted by Random House, Inc, Published simul- taneously in Toronto, Canada, by Random House of Canada, Limited. viginally published in Portuguese by Livraria José Olymplo Fditéra as ‘Grande Sertdo: Veredas in 1958. Aracy, my wife, Ara, THIS BOOK BELONGSThe Place of Guimaraes Rosa in Brazilian Literature Tean nxcaLt only one instance of a greater impact on contem- porary Brazilian literature than that produced by the books of Guimaries Rosa: the publication of Gilberto Freyre's Casa Grande e Senzala (The Masters and the Slaves) in 1993. The repercussion of the Pernambucan sociologist’s book was felt throughout Brazil. Moreover, it became the point of departure for a group of novelists who found their inspiration in the drama of the people and the land of Brazil: José Lins do Rego, Graci- liano Ramos, Erico Verissimo, Rachel de Queiroz, José Americo de Almeida, Lucio Cardoso, Otavio de Faria, José Geraldo Vieira, to mention only the most outstanding. Guimardes Rosa mado his appearance on the literary scene ten years Tater with a book of short stories, Sagarana. He and bis fellow trail-blazers represent the second generation, whose ‘themes reflect that upsurge in their country’s development set off by the Revolution of 1930, an upsurge which has been in the nature of an ascending spiral. These are novelists and short-story writers such as Dalcidio Jurandir, Herberto Sales, James Amado, Josué Montello, Hernani-Donato, Adonias Filho, José Conde. The movement was characterized by a determined and highly controversial effort to give new forms to the literary languageviii THE DEVIL TO PAY (still unpolished and rough in the first generation of writers, who were engaged in the task of transforming the vernacular of Brazil into an instrument of artistic creation), The new litera ture divided critics and public; some became enthusiastfe sup- porters, others violent opponents. ‘The critics were more divided than the public, as though they ‘were exclusively concerned with and saw only the formal, stylistic aspect of Guimardes Rosa’s work through which he was attempting to create, in keeping with the subject matter, a new narrative instrument. The outward cloak of this formal aspect ‘seemed to conceal and hide from certain critics that heaving ‘universe, brutal and tender, violent and gentle, of landscapes, beings, dramas, battles, wild backlands, the cruel, at times Iudi- ccrous sorrows which comprise the vast, unique world of Gui- maries Rosa, Brazilian and universal at one and the same time. “What the public saw, over and above everything else, was the material out of which the work had been created, its content; that is to say, the lived and living flesh-and-blood life that so powerfully imbued it, at times came gushing from it. The pub- lie read and applauded the writer despite the fact that for many the formal expression was often more of a barrier to understand- ing than an avenue of approach. While the critics were arguing the validity of the experiment, quoting Joyce and showing off their erudition, the public realized that a unique figure, a creator of exceptional gifts had emerged on the Brazilian literary scene, whose revealed and revealing world was the sort that helps to build a nation and the awareness of a nation. Tt is odd that Guimarfes Rosa should be a Mineiro. In the cautious and, for the most part, conservative state of Minas Gerais, landlocked and astute, literature is as a rule well- mannered, fiction even mere so than poetry (the poets Carlos Drummond de Andrade and Murilo Mendes are the opposite of wellmannered). Its fiction has not yet freed itself from the apron strings of Machado de Assis, and goes on recreating the unimaginative, mediocre life of the middle class, eschewing startling innovations, experiments with language, a veritable model of polite phrasing. Nothing could be further removed from this than Corpo de Baile or Grande Sertdo: Veredas (The IN THE BACKLANDS ix Devil to Pay in the Backlands). For me, Guimaraes Rosa is a novelist of Bahfa rather than Minas Gerais, and I think my po- sition in this matter is perfectly tenable. There is a part of Minas Gerais, that which forms the setting ef The Devil to Pay in the Backlands, which is a prolongation of the backlands of Bahia in its customs, its language, the make-up and character of its people. And this backland of Bahia—that of the great bandits, the leaders of outlaws, the indomitable backlanders— is Guimaraes Rosa territory, the clay with which he works, into which he plunges his hands in the act of creation. All this he bears within himself, as though this distinguished diplomat —nobody could be a greater gentleman or more refined—went invisibly shod in rope sandals, wearing the leather jerkin of the backlander over his soul, and armed with blunderbuss and vio- ence. He carries this within himself, and returns it to his peo- plein a work of dimensions rarely achieved in literature (I have ‘deliberately said “literature” and not “Brazilian literature”). Thelieve L was among the first to grasp and call attention to the importance of Guimaraes Rosa's achievement as a novelist and to foresee the rapid universalization of his work. Not so much or even because of its formal aspect, more limited to our national frontiers, as because of the world revealed, re-created, and given enduring life through the extraordinarily achieved beings, through the Brazil that breathes in its every page. Guimaraes Rosa’s case is, in my opinion, completely different from that of Mario de Andrade, the Mario of Macunaima, and other Brazilian “modernistas.” Mario drew mainly on books for his material, saw Brazil through a veil of erudition, and for that reason failed to reach the people, Guimaraes Rosa had so much to narrate, to reveal, to bring forth that he had to create an in- strument of control—his language—to keep the spate, the flood within bounds, and bring order to his creation. But what will insure his greatness in the judgment of foreign readers, and ‘equate his name with those of the great contemporary writers of fiction, is his creative power, the Brazilian authenticity of his characters, the pulsating life that animates his every page. ‘On the occasion of the publication in English of The Devil to Pay in the Backlands by Alfred A. Knopf, a friend of literatureX «THE DEVIL TO PAY IN THE BACKLANDS and a friend of Brazil, thus bringing our master novelist to the knowledge of a new public, and adding new readers to those Guimaraes Rosa already has abroad, it makes me happy to have this opportunity to pay tribute to the great writer to whose for- mation my generation, which immediately preceded his, con- tributed and for whom we cleared the way. The English-reading public will make the acquaintance of one of the greatest books our literature has produced, brutal, tender, cordial, savage, vast as Brazil itself, the image of Brazil drawn by a writer with a consummate mastery of his craft. Led by the hand of Guimaraes Rosa, the turbulent men and women from the heart of the back- lands enter upon that immortality which art alone can give them. The Devil to Pay in the Backlands bears witness—cer- tainly as much as the great industrial establishments of Sio Panlo—to the maturity Brazil and its people have reached, JORGE AMADO Rio de Janeiro, September 1962 BREESE QR THE DEVIL TO PAY IN THE BACKLANDSQQQ BREESE eogoneees T’S NOTHING. ‘Those shots you heard were not men fighting, God be praised. It was just me there in the back yard, target-shooting down by the creek, to keep in practice. I do it every day, because I enjoy it; have ever since I was a boy. Aitenwards, they came to me about a calf, a stray white one, with the queerest eyes, and a muzzle like a dog. They told me aboat it but I didn’t want to see it, On account of the deformity it was born with, with lips drawn back, it looked like somebody laughing. Man-face or dog- face: that scttled it for them; it was the devil. Foolish folk, They killed it, Don’t know who it belonged to, They came to borrow my gun and I let them have it ‘You are smiling, amusedlike. Listen, when it is a real gun- fight, all the dogs start barking, immediately—then when it's over you go to see if anyhody got killed. You will have to excuse it, sir, but this is the sertdo.” Some say it’s not—that the real * A glossary of Brazilian terms will be found at the end of the book.4 THE DEVIL TO PAY sertdo is way out yonder, on the high plains, beyond the Uructiia River. Nonsense, For those of Corinto and Curvelo, then, isn’t sight here the sertio? Ab, but there's more to it than that! The sertdo describes itself: it is where the grazing lands have no fences; where you can keep going ten, fifteen leagues without coming upon a single house; where a criminal can safely hide out, beyond the reach of the authorities. The Urucéla rises in the mountains to the west. But today, on its banks, you find everything: huge ranches bordering rich lowlands, the flood plains; farms that stretch from woods to woods; thick trees in virgin forests—some are still standing, The surrounding lands are the gerais, These gerais are endless. Anyway, the gentleman knows how it Is: each one believes what he likes: hog, pig, or swine, is as you opine. The sertao is everywhere. ‘About the devil? Thave nothing to say. Ask the others around here. Like fools, theyre afraid even to mention his name; in- stead they say the Que-Diga, the What-You-May-Call-tim. Bab! Not me, Over-avoiding a thing is a way of living with It. Take ‘Aristides, who lives in that palm grove there on the right, on the creck called Vereda-da-Vaca-Mansade-Santa-Rita. Every- body believes what he says: that there are certain places, three of them, that he can't go near without hearing a faint crying behind him, and litle voice saying: “Im coming! I'm coming!” It’s the Whoosis, the What-You-May-CallHim. And then take Jisé Simplicio. Anybody here will swear to you that he keeps 2 ‘captive demon in his house—a little imp who is obliged to help hhim in his shady dealings, which is why Simplicio 1s on his way to getting rich. They say this is also the reason Simplicio’s horse shivers and shies when Simplicio tries to mount, Superstition, Jisé Simplicio and Aristides are prospering, imp or no imp. Now listen to this: there are people who insist that the devil himself stopped off at Andrequicé while passing through there recently. It seems that a certain young man, a stranger, showed up and boasted that he could get from there here in only twenty min- utes —it takes a full day and a half on horscback—because he ‘would go around the headwaters of the Rio do Chico.* Perhaps, Who knows—no offense intended—it could have been you your- A nickname for the Sio Francisco River. IN THE BACKLANDS 5 self when you passed through there, just joking for the fun of it? Don’t hold it against me—I know you didn’t. I meant no harm, It 1s just that sometimes a question at the right time clears the air. But, you understand, sir, if there was such a young man, he just wanted to pull somebody's leg. Because, to circle the headwaters he would have to go deep into this state of ‘ours and then double back, a trip of some three months. Well, then? The Whoosis? Nonsense. Imagination. And then this business of politely calling the devil by other names—that’s practically inviting him to appear in person, in the flesh!_Me, 1 have just about lost all my belief in him, thanks to God; and that’s the honest truth I'm telling you, though I know he is taken for a fact and the Holy Gospels are full of him. Once 1 was talking with a young seminarian, very amiable he was, turning the pages and reading in his prayer book. He had on his, vestments and bore a wand of chaste-tree in his hand. He said he was going to help the priest drive the Whoosis out of an old woman of Cachoeira-dosBois, I don't believe a word of it, My ‘compadre Quelemém claims that its the lower spirits that cause these manifestations, the third-class ones, milling about in the pitch darkness, secking contact with the living, and that some- times they will give a man real support. My compadre Quelemém 4s the one who eases my mind—Quelemém de Géis is his full rname. But he lives so far from here—at Jijujé, on the Vereda do Buritf Pardo. But tell me, when it comes to being possessed of a devil, or helped by one, you too must have known of cases— men—women? Isn't that so? As for me, I've seen so many that T leamed to spot them: Rincha-Mae, Sanguedoutro, Muitos- Beicos, Rasga-em Baixo, Faca-Fria, Fancho-Bode, a certain Tre- ciiano, Azinhavre, Hermégenes—a whole herd of them. If I could only forget so many names . . . I'm not a horse wrangler, ‘And besides, anyone who fools around with the notion of be- coming a jagunco, as I did, is already opening the door to the devil. Yes? No? In my early days, I tried my hand at this and that, but as for thinking, I just didn't. Didn’t have time. I was like a live fish on. 8 griddle—when you're hard-pressed you waste no tims in day- dreams, But now, with time on my hands and no special wor-6 THE DEVIL TO PAY les, T ean lie in my hammock and speculate, Does the devil exist, or doesn’t he? That's what I'd like to know. I give up. Look: there is such a thing as a waterfall, isn't there? Yes, but 1a waterfall is only a high bank with water tumbling over the edge. Take away the water, or level the bank—what becomes of the waterfall? Livingis a very dangerous business . . « Let me wy to explain: when the devil is inside a man, in his guts, the man is either evil or suffers bad luck, But, on his own, a man as such has no devil in him. Not one! Do you agree? Tell me frankly—youll be doing me a great favor, and T ask it of you from my heart. This matter, however foolish it may seem, js important to me. I wish it wasn’t, But don’t tell me that a ‘wise and learned person like you, sir, believes in the devil! You don't? I thank you. Your opinion reassures me. I knew you felt that way—I expected you would—I give you credit for it, Ah! when a man is old he needs to rest easy. I thank you again. All right, then, there is no devil. And no spirits. I never saw any. And if anybody was to see one, it should be me, your humble servant. If I was to tell you . . . So, the devil rules hnis black kingdom, in animals, in men, in women, Even in children, I say. For isn’t there a saying: “A child-—spawn of the devil?” And in things, in plants, in waters, in the earth, in the wind . . . “The devil in the street, in the middle of the whicl- wind.” What? Ah, yes. Just an idea of mine, memories of things worse than bad. It’s not that it hurts me to talk about them. It's Deiter, it relieves me. Look here: in the same ground, and with branches and leaves of the same shape, doesn't the sweet cassava, which we eat, grow and the bitter cassava, which lulls? Now the strange thing is that the sweet cassava can turn ‘poisonous—why, I don't know. Some say it is from being re- planted over and over in the same soil, from cuttings—it ‘grows more and more bitter and then poisonous. But the other, the bitter cassava, sometimes changes t00, and for no reason tums sweet and edible. How do you account for that? And hhave you ever seen the ugliness of glaring hate in the eyes of a rattlesnake? Or a fat hog, happier every day in its brutishness, that would gladly swallow the whole world if it could, for its IN THE BAGKLANDS 7 filthy satisfaction? And some hawks and crows—just the look of them shows their need to slash and tear with that beak honed sharp by evil desire. There are even breeds of twisted, horrible, rocks, that poison the water in a well, if they lie at the bottom of it. The devil sleeps in them. Did you know that? And the devil—which is the only way you can call a malign spirit— by whose orders and by what right does he go around doing as he damn well pleases? Mixed up in everything, he is. ‘What wears him out, little by litle, the devil inside folks, is suffering wisely. Also the joy of love—so says my compadre Quelemém. The family. Is that the thing? It is and it isn‘. Everything is and isn’t, ‘The most ferocious criminal, of the ‘worst lind, is often a good husband, a good son, a good father, a good friend of his friends. Ive known some like that, Only, there is the hereafter—and God too. Many’s the cloud I've seen, But, truly, children do soften one. Listen to this: a certain Aleixo, who lives a league from Passo do Pubo, on the Areia River, used to be one of the most cold-blooded villains you ever heard of. Near his house he had a little pond among the palm trees, and in it he kept some fierce trafras, immense ones, famous for their size. Aleixo used to feed them every day at the same hour, and soon they learned to come out of thetr hiding places to be fed, just as if they were trained. Well, one day, just for the hell of it, Aleixo killed a litle old man who had ‘come around begging. Don’t you doubt it, sir, there are people {in this hateful world who kill others just to see the faces they make as they die. You can foresee the rest: comes the bat, ‘comes the rat, comes the cat, comes the trap. This Aleixo was a family man, with young children, whom he loved beyond all reason. Now listen to this: less than a year after killing the old ‘man, Aleixo's children took sick. A mild epidemic of measles, it ‘was said, but complications set in; it seemed as though the children would never get well. Finally they got over it. But their eyes became red, terribly inflamed, and nothing seemed to do any good. Then—I don't know whether all at the same time or one by one—they all went blind, Blind, without a glim- ‘mer of light. Just think of it—stairsteps, three little boys and a little girl—all blind. Hopelessly blind.8 THE DEVIL TO PAY Aleixo did not lose his mind, but he changed; ah, how he changed! Now he lives on God's side, sweating to be good and kind every hour of the day and night. It even seems that he has become happy which he wasn't before—considers himself lucky, he says, because God chose to take pity on him, chang- ing the direction of his soul in that way. When I heard that it made my blood boll! Because of the children. If Aleixo had to be punished, how were the little ones to blame for his sins? My compadre Quelemém reproved me for my doubts. Said that surely in a former existence the children had been wicked, t00, chips off the old block, imps of the same hell that bred him. What do you think, sir? And what about the little old man who was murdered? I know what you are going to say: that he too ‘may have had some hidden crime to atone for. If, as Quelemém says, folks ate reincarnated, I suppose a dead enemy could return as the child of his enemy. Listen to this one: there is a fellow, Pedro Pind6, who lives six leagues from here, a good ‘man in every way, he and his wife both good people, well thought of. They have a son about ten years old, called Valtéi —one of those fancy names that folks around here go in for nowadays. Well, this litle shaver, from the moment he had a glimmer of intelligence, began to show his real nature—mean and cruel as all gotout, fond of evil to the depth of his soul. Every litle creature or insect that he could catch he would slowly torture to death. Once he saw a colored woman lying dead drunk, and took a piece of broken bottle and slashed her leg in three places. What made that kid drool with pleasure was to sce a chicken bled or a hog butchered. “I like to kill.” this little monster said to me once. It gave me a tum, for when a fledgling leans out of the nest itis getting ready to fy Now the father, Pedro Pind6, to correct this, and the mother too, have been beating the boy half to death; they deny hhim food; they tie him to a tree, naked as the day he was born, even in the cold of June; they work his little body over with strap and thong until the blood runs, then they wash off the blood with a gourdful of brine. Folks know about it and watch, horrified. The boy has grown thinnet and thinner, hhollow-eyed, his bony little face like a death'shead, and he IN THE BACKLANDS 5 hhas got consumption—coughs all the time—the kind of dry cough that tears the lungs. It is plain to see that beating the boy has now grown to be a habit with Pindé and his wife, and little by little they have come to find an ugly pleasure in it setting the beatings at contenient times, and even calling people in to witness the good example. I don't think the boy will last much Ionger, not even till next Lent; he is teetering on the brink now. Well? If what my compadre Quelemén says isn't true, how do you explain a situation like that? At one time that boy must have been a man—one with a debit of terrible deeds, and a soul black as pitch. It showed. Now he is paying. Ab, but it so happens that when he is eying and moaning, he is suffering just as though he were a good child. Lord, what haven't I seen in this world! I've even seen a horse with the hiccups—and that's a rare sight, Well and good, but, you will probably say, in the beginning —the sins and evil-doing of people—how did it all get so balled up at the start? That's what stumps everyone, My compadre Quelemém included. I am only a backlander, and T lose my bearings among such notions. My greatest envy is of men like yourself, sir, full of reading and learning. Not that I can't read and write. I learned to read in a year and a half, by dint of primer, memory, and the ferule. 1 had a teacher: Master Lucas, at Curralinho. T memorized grammar, the mul liplication tables, the ruleof-three, even geography and our nation’s history. On large sheets of paper I drew pretty maps with careful strokes. Ah, not meaning to brag, but right from the start they found me very quick-witted, And thought I ought to be sent to study Latin at the Royal School—they said that, too. The good old days! Even now I enjoy a good book, taking it easy. At LimAozinho, the ranch that belongs to my friend Vito Sozlano, they subscribe to a fat yearly almanac, full of Puzzles, riddles, all sorts of different things. I give first place to more worthwhile reading—the lives of saints, their virtues and example—shrewd missionaries outwitting the Indians, or Saint Francis of Assisi, Saint Anthony, Saint Gerald. I am very fond of morality. To reason with others, exhort them to followi THE DEVIL TO PAY the tight path, to give wise counsel. My wife, as you know, watches out for me: she prays a lot. She is a saint. My com- padre Quelemém always says chat I have nothing t wory Bhout, that with my good backing, powerful spirits protect me Yeosit! ‘That suits me fine! And I help out with wanting to helieve. But I am not always able to. I want you to know: all ry life I have thought for myself. T was born different. T am ‘what am, I know almost nothing—but I have my doubts about jnany things. At ranging far afield, 1 am like a well-trained hnunting dog, You turn loose any idea in my head and Til track it down in the deepest woods. Look: what we ought to have is a meeting of scholars, statesmen, high authorities, to seule the ‘atter, proclaim once for all, in joint assembly, that there is hho devil, he doesn't exist, he can't. Give it the force of law! Only thus would people have peace of mind. Why doesn’t the government do something about it? “Ab, I know it’s not possible. Don't take me for a fool. Is one thing to put forth good ideas, and another to deal with a country cof people, of flesh and blood, and their thousand and one problems. So many people—it's frightening to think of—and Fone satisfied, all being born, growing up, getting married, ‘wanting a job, food, health, wealth, recognition, rain, good husiness. So you have to choose: either to join in the rat race, or give yourself up to religion and nothing else. I could have been a priest or a jagunco chief: T was born for one or the other, But I missed out on both counts. Now old age has caught up with me, And theumatista. As one might say, III soon be cating grass by the roots. ‘What I firmly believe, declare, and set forth, is this: the schole world is crazy. You, sir, I, we, everybody. That's the main Toason we need religion: to become unmaddened, regain our Sanity. Praying is what cures madness. Usually. Tt is the falvation of the soul. Lots of religion, young man. As for me, I dhever mise a chance. I take advantage of all of them. I drink ‘water from any river. In my opinion just one religion isn't Cnough. I pray the Christian, Catholic prayers, and I take efuge in what 1s certain, I also accept the prayers of my compadre Quelemém, according to his doctrine, that of Kardec, IN THE BACKLANDS n But when I can I go to Mindubim, where there is one Mathias, a Protestant, a Methodist: they reproach themselves for their sins, read the Bible out loud, and pray, and sing their beautiful hymns, It all calms me down, allays my worries. Any shade refreshes me. But only for the time being. I would like to pray—all the time. Many persons do not agree with me; they say that the true religion is only one—exclusive, That's an idea Tdetest. ‘There is a colored Woman, Maria Le6ncia, who lives not far from here, whose prayers are famous for their potency. I pay her, every month, to say a chaplet for me every blessed day, and a rosary on Sundays. It is worth it, it really is. My wife sees no harm in it. And I've already sent word to another one to come to see me, a certain Isma Calanga, of Vau-Vau, whose prayers too, it is sald, are of great merit and profit. I'm going to make the same kind of deal with her. I want to have several sich om my se defending me before God. By the wounds of ist Living is a dangerous business. Longing too ardently for something good can be in some ways like wishing for some- thing bad. Those men! All were grabbing at the world for themselves, to set it aright. But each saw and understood things only in his own way. At the top of the list, ahead of all the others, the one of greatest integrity, was Medeiro Vaz. What a ‘man, like those of old! Jodozinho Bem-Bem, the fiercest of all, nobody could ever figure out what he was really like inside. Joca Ramiro—a prince of a man—was a politico. Zé Bebelo ‘wanted to be a politico, but he was both lucky and unlucky—a fox that dilly-dallied, $6 Candelério turned mean as the devil because he thought he had an incurable disease. Titio Passos depended on his friends for everything: only through them, through their friendship, was it that he rose so high among the Jagungos. Anténio Dé—a mean bandit. But only one half of him, albeit the greater half. Andalécio, at bottom a man of ‘good will, but a madman in dealing out punishment. Ricardio even—all he wanted was to be rich and at peace; that was what be was fighting for. Hermégenes was the only one who was born a tiger and a murderer. And Urutd-Branco, the White