Shakespeare’s Influence in Grande sertão

veredas – The Three Women and the Three Metals

Abstract

This article discusses how it is updated, in Grande sertão: veredas, a fundamental theme for the tragedy King Lear: the love choice involving three women related to gold, silver and lead. The symbology related to the metals is decisive for the characterization of the female characters of both the novel and the tragedy, analyzed here, in a comparative perspective. In King Lear, the precious metals, gold and silver, are associated with Goneril and Reagan, the evil daughters who inherit the kingdom, while Cordelia, Lear’s kind and preferred daughter, is represented by lead and ends up disinherited. In Grande sertão: veredas, gold and silver emerge in the characterization of Nhorinhá, the prostitute with whom Riobaldo falls in love, and Otacília, his wife, while Diadorim, the true love, is related to lead, and remains sublimated. Thus, the precious metals, in both works, symbolize the loving mistake, while the lead keeps the right woman – Cordelia, in the tragedy, and Diadorim in the novel. Diadorim and Cordélia also have other analogies: both are daughters of great leaders, dedicate unrestricted fidelity to their father, have a connection with the warrior-maiden archetype, and their deaths represent moments of anagnorisis for Riobaldo and Lear.