Eça's "Tragédia": The Editions, the Polemic, and Their Implications

Author(s): William L. King and Ronald W. Sousa

Source: Luso-Brazilian Review, Vol. 18, No. 1 (Summer, 1981), pp. 197-203
Published by: University of Wisconsin Press
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/3513305
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E a's Tragedia: The Editions, the
Polemic, and Their Implications
William L. King and Ronald W. Sousa

Early in 1980 two competing editions were issued of A Traggdia

da Rua das FZores, a novel that Ega de Queiroz wrote and then ap-
parently rejected, never revising it for publication. The edi-
tions, released in early March, were published by Livros do Brasil
of Lisbon (366 pp.) and by Moraes Editores, also of Lisbon (468
pp.); they treat Ega's manuscript original in quite different
ways.
The Moraes editors attempt to produce a thoroughly readable
text, editing out confusing parallel passages, settling on read-
ings of words when the author's orthography is inconsistent, when
he uses abbreviations or symbols, or when a difficult-to-read sec-
tor appears in the manuscript (Ega's handwriting could, apparent-
ly, reach truly hermetic proportions). On the other hand, the
Moraes editors do not choose one version when names of characters
change from one section of the manuscript to the next but rather
reproduce the changes as the manuscript has them. The goals of
the edition are more or less fully explained in an Introduction,
which also deals informatively with the question of the era of the
novel's composition and with its place in Ega's career.
The Livros do Brasil editor, by contrast, attempts merely to
make from the original a text that can be followed. Many irregu-
larities-among them passages clearly discarded by the author-are
left, footnotes inserted in explanation; parallel passages are re-
produced in notes or appendices, as is Ega's outline of the novel;
many orthographic vagaries are left as they appear. While it
might at first seem that the edition has critical intent, it in-
cludes no apparatus to that end, nor is there introductory expla-
nation of methods used or of the editor's goals-and, for anyone
involved in study of Ega de Queiroz or of the Portuguese nine-
teenth century, the errors are many and obvious.
Any initial confusion about the reasons for the divergent edi-
tions can easily be allayed: the reasons are financial-and
rooted in the history of Ega's literary estate. It has long been
known how thoroughly that estate is "managed" by the writer's

Luso-Brazilian Review XVIII, 1 0024-7413/81/0197 $1.00

? 1981 by the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System
197

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198 Luso-Brazilian Review 18:1

heirs; litigation over public versus inheritors' rights has been

frequent, one of the most damaging cases being the eventual removal
from the market of Lello's Obra CompZeta de Eca de Queiroz (3 vols.
[Porto, n.d.]), a work that contained material nowhere else avail-
able. Litigation of a similar sort-to the same result-was on-
going in Brazil early last year. The two editions of Tragedia re-
sult from a recent change in author's-rights law in Portugal that
had the effect of bringing Eca's literary estate into the public
domain. The new legislation was proclaimed in July of 1979 and
took effect in March of 1980-not coincidentally, the time of the
volumes' publication.l The two editions thus in fact entered into
competition in a changed market situation: one in which the
rights to works no longer need be purchased and in which materials
heretofore unavailable to a public interested in Eca de Queiroz
can no longer be suppressed by the writer's heirs. The circum-
stances surrounding the publication of these two editions are not,
however, without further complications resulting from the estate's
history-complications which have much to do with the differences
between the two books. The Moraes edition benefits from access to
materials that remained in the hands of the family: the edited
manuscript of Tragddia prepared by Eca's son Jose Maria at the
time of the mid-1920s Lello printing of the bulk of Eca's "post-
humous" work, and as well editor's proofs of that version (it was
later removed from the series before publication, for reasons that
will be alluded to in a later paragraph of this analysis). The
Moraes edition thus benefits from an entire preparation carried
out by the acknowledged expert in his father's notation and takes
on the status of an "authorized" edition. Such favored status re-
sulted from payment of a fee to the estate, a fee which Livros do
Brasil-the house that has published all of Eca's "non-posthumous"
work-openly states that it found so large that it did not feel it
could pay. Its edition, by contrast, seems to have been prepared
hurriedly only in order to get a book out at the same time as
Moraes and get a share of the market for the work. The edition's
source was the manuscript that has lain for a number of years in
the Biblioteca Nacional de Lisboa (we are unable to ascertain
whether it is the original or a reproduction).
The presence of the two differing editions has engendered a
considerable review of the entire Queiroz canon and heated discus-
sion of the editions themselves. That outpouring is to be found
scattered through newspapers and periodicals in Portugal and
Brazil (where the two competing editions were also released, in
late March); virtually all of it finds resume in the Lisbon news-
paper Diario de Noticias (henceforth, DN). A necessary preliminary
to setting the controversy in its proper perspective, however, as
well as to analyzing some of the valuable information pinpointed
by it, is a brief look at Tragedia itself.
The composition of the novel is datable in the period from 1877
to 1879: the era of the success of 0 Primo BasZlio, the second
revision of 0 Crime do Padre Amaro, and Eca's inception of a host
of projects, most of which he never brought to fruition and which
saw publication only after his death (A Capital, "A Catastrofe,"

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King & Sousa 199

Alves e C. , 0 Conde de Abranhos, etc.). Trag6dia treats the

development and realization of an incestuous relationship between
-mother and son, while at the same time caricaturing various of the
"types" in middle- and upper-level Lisbon society. It thus in
many ways resembles Os Maias; indeed, it clearly was drawn upon
for features of the great novel of 1888-to the point that similar
characters recur with similar names and like incidents appear.
Echoes of A Capital are also to be found in Trag6dia. The key
difference between Tragedia and Os Maias is that in the earlier
work the incestuous nature of the relationship is unknown to both
mother and son until its revelation at the end of the novel, upon
which revelation the mother, in good Romantic style, commits sui-
cide. Hence the divergences from the problematic raised by the
brother-sister relationship of Os Maias, which goes on uncontrol-
lably even after its nature is discovered. That continuance be-
comes the central symbol of the ethical degradation to be found as
well in the sub-plots and caricatures of Os Maias and, in focusing
them all, comes to characterize Portuguese bourgeois society. No
such wider implications attend the similar relationship in
Tragedia. To be sure, it is but a draft; its contours, however,
reveal a work quite different from Os Maias. While the constella-
tion of events in the latter results in a unified characterization
of society, Tragedia sets forth a series of realistically-portrayed
individual events and little more; while Os Maias consitutes a
complex ethical commentary, Traggdia remains a mere tale, with
primarily sensationalistic value.2 And, in the state in which it
was left by its author, it is erratic, clumsy, in places impene-
trable.
The only sensible evaluation of the manuscript is that its
value is almost wholly scholarly; it casts light on an era in Ega's
career, on his methods of writing, and on the genesis of later
works. It should probably have been accorded a careful critical
edition, structured in a way that would have made it usable by
general readership as well, rather than the two editions now
available, neither of which approaches the status of a critical
editing.
Hence the furor over their appearance, which ranges from
curiosity to anger-and which provides some useful information for
readers and students of Ega's work. We do not here mean to give a
digest of the items in the controversy, much less to characterize
it. We merely touch on items that aid in seeing the critical re-
action to Tragedia or that provide further information about the
Queiroz canon.
The major purpose of the bulk of the articles is evaluation of the
editions. The best piece in that vein is Joao Gaspar Simoes, "A
TragediadaRua das Flores" (DN, March 20, 1980). In addition to
setting the novel within the overall development of Ega's career,
Simoes characterizes the Moraes edition as "correcta, leglvel,
digna" and the Livros do Brasil edition as "simplesmente vergonho-
sa," "um logro para o leitor." He goes on to explain in detail
some of the many errors that appear in the latter. As regards the
Moraes edition, he notes some editorial inconsistencies but

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200 Luso-Brazilian Review 18:1

concludes that the book was done as well as possible under the
circumstances. In such language he echoes, in terms stronger than
those used by most of the other commentators, the majority opinion
of the editions.3
Simoes's article touches on another topic as well: the novel's
place in Ega's personal/literary "history"-that is, what Tragedia
reveals about Ega's much-discussed complex about women, that com-
plex's possible relationship to the circumstances of his birth and
upbringing-and thus his relationship with his mother, his alleged
projection of the complex upon his writing, and so on. Simoes's
manner of approaching the question clearly echoes the Freudianism
of his Vida e Obra de Eca de Queiroz.
Another speculator along similar lines is Pedro Luzes, the
President of the Portuguese Society of Psychoanalysis and a pro-
fessor at the University of Lisbon. His "Em Busca de Ega de Queiros"
(DN, April 7, 1980) treats the psychological implications of
incest for Ega. Born illegitimate four years before the marriage
of his parents-during which time his mother apparently often re-
jected marriage to his father, Ega spent his first year with a wet
nurse. Then his paternal grandparents cared for him until their
deaths when he was ten years old. Next an uncle and an aunt were
responsible for him until his graduation from Coimbra. Luzes sug-
gests that consequently E9a's real mother, Carolina, represented
predominantly negative aspects for him-and that she is evoked in
the mother-figures of Tragedia and Os Maias, both of whom abandon
their sons for a sensual passion. E9a's great love was his first
cousin Cristina, daughter of the aunt, Carlota, with whom he lived
between age ten and his graduation. Twice he asked for Cristina's
hand, but it was refused on the grounds of consanguinity.4 L
concludes that Ega's real love was Carlota, his aunt and mother-
figure, and that the love was transferred to her daughter because
of the lesser level of social taboo in relation to cousins and be-
cause of the general ambivalence that the mother-figure held for
him. Luzes's summary is that the formula for the autobiographical
input in the novels is: "I love Carlota and Cristina but not
Carolina, but I cannot desire either the mother or the daughter
because they remind me of my real mother." Luzes also states that
for Eca women therefore either are prostitutes or are weak and
marked for life, and that the writer projects the entire complex
into his literary work. Luzes explains that the family's long-
standing prohibition of Tragedia, dating from the last-minute de-
cision not to publish it in the 1920s, derived from the trans-
parency of this psychological complex within the novel.
A third major line of inquiry is picked up by Joaquim Romero de
Magalhaes,in his two-installment article "A Tragedia P6stuma de Eca
de Queir6s" (DN, April 17 and24, 1980). As had Simoes, briefly,
before him, Magalhaes raises a question about the texts of vir-
tually the entire Queiroz canon. He states that Tragedia's im-
mense textual problems-so great that the professional calligraph-
er who prepared the Livros do Brasil edition committed many errors
in mere decipherment-are far from unique; indeed, they are typi-
cal. The fact is that Eca's literary remains often included

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King & Sousa 201

several varying versions of works, all written in his difficult

notation, making a single "text" an unworkable concept, but one
that was adhered to for publication purposes. He observes too
that all the collections, even those made of works published in
serials during Eca's lifetime, are suspect, for all have been
"selected" and many have been "edited" by Eca's family or
"friends." Apparently, the editing done by Jose Maria for the
Lello publication of "posthumous" works included much more than
mere decipherment of his father's difficult hand. The son ad-
mitted to making judicious cuts, even to eliminating a character
who appeared in one manuscript version of A Capital. Further, it
has been demonstrated that some sectors of such works were "im-
proved" through reordering.5 The upshot of the remarks made
Magalhaes, Simoes, and others is that only a variorum edition of
works left in manuscript, a return to original sources for works
selected from serial publications during the author's lifetime,
and determination to publish everything that Eca wrote can with
total surety give to the Queiroz scholar exactly what the author
wrote-and they all call for an undertaking to that end.6
Indeed, when one considers the "unrevised" status of A Ilustre
Casa de Ramires and the fact that A Cidade e as Serras was
finished by a "friend" after Eca's death, the inevitable conclu-
sion is that only 0 Crime do Padre Amaro, 0 Primo BaslZio, 0
Mandarim, A ReZlquia, and Os Maias, five novels out of the thou-
sands of pages of "Eca de Queiroz" to which today's reader has ac-
cess, can be surely said to present texts that exist on a basis
definable in consistent terms. Magalhaes also adds an appeal for
an organized edition of the writer's correspondence, now edited
dispersed through many volumes, with much yet unpublished.
This last product of the debate over A Tragedia da Rua das
FZores may, in the long run, be the most meaningful for the
author's readers and students. It is to be hoped that the coming-
together of information about the status of the Queiroz canon in-
cited by this newest publication will lead to corrective result

Notes

1The laws that effected that change in status are Diari

Repiblica, Ia. Serie, No. 72 (26-3-1980), NOs. 53, 54, proclaimed
in July of 1979, to take effect on March 26, 1980. Accompanying
remarks proclaimed governmental intent to bring Portuguese
author's-rights law into accord with international convention (see
Diario de Not?cias [Lisbon], July 14, 1979 and December 13, 1979).
The above laws stipulated a twenty percent payment to the state
for use of public-domain materials, a provision that, it was later
argued, provided a mechanism that might be used in indirect cen-
sorship. Consequently, the laws were annulled and replaced, last
September, with DR, Ia Serie, N?- 222 (25-9-1980), N?- 393, which
in essence repeats the earlier two measures without the taxing.
In application to the Queiroz estate, those changes hasten en-
trance of the bulk of the estate into the public domain by eleven

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202 Luso-Brazilian Review 18:1

years and define the legal status of a work such as Tragedia,

which, having never before appeared in print, previously occupied
a vaguely-defined legal area.
For an understanding of the vicissitudes of the estate under
the varying author's-rights codes from the turn of the century to
the present, see the printed briefs of the lawsuit of 1965-1968
between the Lello publishing company and the heirs: Direitos de
Autor a Obra Literdria de Eca de Queiroz; Pecas do Processo Judi-
cial (Lisboa, 1969). A resume follows. While the Queiroz estate
had sold to Lello all rights to the works published in Eca's life-
time and to his "posthumous" works (a designation that includes
only the specific titles published by Lello in the 1920s), that
sale was made when heirs could hold rights for only fifty-six
years after an author's death. In 1927, the law was changed to
provide for possession of rights in perpetuity. The court ruled
that, Eca having died in 1900, in 1956 the rights had legally re-
verted to the heirs in perpetuity rather than remaining in perpe-
tuity with Lello. Complicating the case further was that in 1966
new author's-rights legislation had been proclaimed, a portion of
which provided that those who had enjoyed rights in perpetuity would
surrender themtwenty-five years from that date. Therefore, until
the law of 1980, the Queiroz estate (perhaps minus works not involved
in the long legal history such as Tragedia) was scheduled to become
public in 1991. (We wish here to thank Beth Farber, of the Univer-
sity of Minnesota, for help in unearthing this information.)
The heirs' widespread appeal, begun early this year, for the
creation of an internationally-sponsored "Casa Eca de Queiroz," to
be located at the family estate, is undoubtedly an outgrowth of
the changes in legal status as well.
2Indeed, Manuela de Azevedo, "A Trag6didea de a de Queir
Crime da Rua das Flores" (DN, March 27, 1980), suggests that "R
Flores" was used by Eca for commercial-sensationalistic purposes,
since a famous murder-resulting from a love affair-had taken
place there in 1870, thus fixing the street name in the public
mind.
3We are told informally but authoritatively that Livros do
Brasil is preparing its edition wholly anew, presumably in reac-
tion to the criticism it has received.
We should like here to register our own doubts about the Moraes
edition. While decidedly the more accurate and readable of the
two, it is far from free of major errors. For example, in foot-
note 2 on p. 19, one of the editors, the competent Queiroz scholar
Joao Medina, raises a question with regard to characters' names,
pinpointing what he says is a flaw in the plot. On pp. 73-74 of
the text that Medina himself presumably edited, it is very clear
that Eca handles the material in such a way that no such flaw
exists. This is not the only error in the Moraes edition.
4Luzes draws for analysis of Eca's biography upon several
sources, principally the highly controversial Thomaz d'Eca Leal,
Eqa de Queiroz Menino e Moco (Lisboa, 1954).
5This particular assertion is made by Simoes in his article; he
says that it was demonstrated by Jean Girodon, in 1961. We are

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 King & Sousa 203

unaware of the nature and format of that demonstration.

6Another article that makes that call is Azevedo (see note 2,
above). The article is interesting too for the author's familiar-
ity with Epa's heirs and their intentions.
7Curiously enough, the desired result may be facilitated by one
of the implications of the present situation: a declared purpose
of the heirs' proposed "Casa Eca de Queiroz" is the creation of
critical editions of the writer's work.

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