Alice through Macunaíma's looking-glass

Résumé

The comparison of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland and Through the looking-glass with Mário de Andrade's Macunaíma leads to the delimitation of the achievements of these books. A critical evaluation is made of their emphasis on the question of language, their relation to other pre-existent texts of which they avail themselves, and the relative openness of each of the texts to external influences. The shift of critical standpoint obtained by focusing on a book from the viewpoint of another book allows a new appreciation of each and the revelation of what each is not. In the gap arising from the difference between the texts it is possible to perceive elements that would not otherwise the visible. The affirmation of one text toward the other can be described as a translation in which the modification undergone by the original and the recreation of aesthetic elements in the final version reach their maximum.