Status
Available
Call number
Genres
Collection
Publication
Avon / Bard Books (1983), Paperback, 317 pages
Description
Against a backdrop of political corruption Jose lives an ordinary life, working a dead-end job catching mice in a dingy movie theater. Everything changes when he meets his wife Rosa thanks to the help of the Happy Heart Marriage Agency. They seem to have an understanding: Jose isn't bothered by Rosa's dishonesty, extra weight, and fantastically promiscuous past; Rosa isn't too put off by Jose's clubbed foot, periodic blackouts, or lack of direction--she just wants a house. Pragmatic, Jose sets out to get the money necessary to make that possible. And in doing so, he manages to become a robber, sniper, and political subversive wanted by the government. Deploying fast-paced, short chapters in a number of styles, Brandao deftly presents an array of engaging characters and conflicts, vividly depicting the absurdity of a repressive political regime with exceptional daring and humor.… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member fieldnotes
After grunting through over three hundred pages of Brandao's prose, I still skimmed the final pages. It is immediately apparent when Brandao thinks that he is on a role: he loses any sort of content filter (did he even have an editor?), balloons his paragraphs and rants, lists, shouts, spews
There aren't any dimensional characters in the book and none of the people are really capable of absorbing or relating to their environment: increasingly repulsive and repressive urban Brazil. In fact, Jose, the closest thing to a protagonist, is a bit like Sean of the Dead (without humor or an actual relationship). He is a purposeless slob immersed in sickening violence.
Why does Brandao think it is okay to write, "Don't know why, but it's true, my heart beats when i see you, parala-la, parala-lay, tooky teeky tooky tootooky, gorogogo gorogoga, elephant stampedes a great many people, two elephants stampede a great many more, oooooo bah tatatatatatatata, oh juicy, juicy festival of striptease."? And why are there dozens of sadistic, pages floundering around in material of this variety, "Whap, whap. Plaft, pleft, shit, he's hit in the mouth, all his teeth are knocked out, his nails pulled out one by one, he's been burned, they've drilled a hole in one eye, thrown acid in the other, stuffed a rat in his mouth, razor slashes and briny water, wires stuck in his asshole, shocks tear him all apart, smash his fingers, his cock, jab him in the stomach, make him eat shit . . . "?
Seriously, who is the author trying to punish with that sort of prose? Both of these excerpts are representative. Neither of them is part of a key plot moment or even about a recognizable moment in the narrative of any main character. They are just outbursts. The most charitable interpretation that I can offer is that Brandao hated almost everyone in Brazil (whether perpetrators of repression or complacent accomplices) and he wanted his book to be a venom-spitting affront to everything that they held sacred or thought pleasant. I'm sure it was a groundbreaking book for it's time and location. I'm sure it posed a sort of challenge to a now defunct establishment and it might be rewarding to read it within the context of Brazilian history and literature. But in order to stand on its own as a book for the casual reader sixty years later and thousands of miles away, it needs more craft, cleaner narrative, less repetition and more imagination. I have no idea why E. L. Doctorow thinks it is so fantastic.
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nonsense and seems to feel proud of the result. He wants to be a more politicized and tragic Latin American James Joyce; but he ends up being more like a foul-mouthed, sensational and disorganized Alfred Doblin (of "Berlin Alexanderplatz" notoriety). I would not have finished this book if I hadn't accidentally started two long train rides without other reading material--and if there hadn't been so much sex, violence and repression. In between steam-rolling sections of mediocre, under-planned, contradictory and unrewarding narrative, there are all sorts of choke-start interruptive paragraphs under recurring headlines like "Free Association" or "Affective Memory." There aren't any dimensional characters in the book and none of the people are really capable of absorbing or relating to their environment: increasingly repulsive and repressive urban Brazil. In fact, Jose, the closest thing to a protagonist, is a bit like Sean of the Dead (without humor or an actual relationship). He is a purposeless slob immersed in sickening violence.
Why does Brandao think it is okay to write, "Don't know why, but it's true, my heart beats when i see you, parala-la, parala-lay, tooky teeky tooky tootooky, gorogogo gorogoga, elephant stampedes a great many people, two elephants stampede a great many more, oooooo bah tatatatatatatata, oh juicy, juicy festival of striptease."? And why are there dozens of sadistic, pages floundering around in material of this variety, "Whap, whap. Plaft, pleft, shit, he's hit in the mouth, all his teeth are knocked out, his nails pulled out one by one, he's been burned, they've drilled a hole in one eye, thrown acid in the other, stuffed a rat in his mouth, razor slashes and briny water, wires stuck in his asshole, shocks tear him all apart, smash his fingers, his cock, jab him in the stomach, make him eat shit . . . "?
Seriously, who is the author trying to punish with that sort of prose? Both of these excerpts are representative. Neither of them is part of a key plot moment or even about a recognizable moment in the narrative of any main character. They are just outbursts. The most charitable interpretation that I can offer is that Brandao hated almost everyone in Brazil (whether perpetrators of repression or complacent accomplices) and he wanted his book to be a venom-spitting affront to everything that they held sacred or thought pleasant. I'm sure it was a groundbreaking book for it's time and location. I'm sure it posed a sort of challenge to a now defunct establishment and it might be rewarding to read it within the context of Brazilian history and literature. But in order to stand on its own as a book for the casual reader sixty years later and thousands of miles away, it needs more craft, cleaner narrative, less repetition and more imagination. I have no idea why E. L. Doctorow thinks it is so fantastic.
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LibraryThing member jonfaith
If it's not cruel, if it doesn't make us suffer, if it doesn't crush what good a man has inside him, then it's not a regime to take seriously.
Zero is an often atonal riff on political oppression, not only in Brasil but globally in the late 1960s. Surely that Brazil is long gone now, the World Cup
Zero is an often atonal riff on political oppression, not only in Brasil but globally in the late 1960s. Surely that Brazil is long gone now, the World Cup
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is around the corner and the Olympics just after. No doubt the world is at least 21.2 percent happier now. The admixture of violence and piety sounds familiar to 2014. Brandão distills Dos Passos and Doblin in creating a dire world of poverty, mindless consumption and a ruthless regime which imprisons and tortures for a higher calling. Damn. Show Less
Awards
Language
Original language
Portuguese
Physical description
317 p.; 6.8 inches
ISBN
0380845334 / 9780380845330
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