Overview

? Now considered a progenitor of South American fiction, Machado de Assis's highly experimental novel is finally rendered as a stunningly contemporary work. Narrating from beyond the grave, Br??s Cubas?an enigmatic, amusing and frequently insufferable antihero?describes his childhood spent tormenting household slaves, his bachelor years of torrid affairs, and his final days obsessing over nonsensical poultices. ?Rejuvenated? (Pradeep Niroula, Chicago Review of Books) by Margaret Jull Costa and Robin Patterson's fresh new translation, Posthumous Memoirs of Br??s Cubas is a work of acerbic mockery and deep pathos that offers a bird's-eye view of how Machado de Assis launched the canon of modernist fiction.?Sprinkled with epigrams, dreams, gags and asides, the story teases, dances and delights.??Economist

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9781324090502

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Reviews

One of the wittiest, most playful, and therefore most alive and ageless books ever written. -- Dave Eggers An offbeat, invigorating classic is perfect reading for a morbid summer. -- The Economist A great ironist, a tragic comedian... In [De Assis] books, in their most comic moments, he underlines the suffering by making us laugh. -- Philip Roth The greatest writer ever produced in Latin America. -- Susan Sontag

The most modern, most startlingly avant-garde novel I read this year was originally published in 1881. Jull Costa and Patterson offer a peerless translation of this comic masterpiece, narrated from beyond the grave by a feckless, pretentious, impossibly winning aristocrat. The Brazilian novelist Machado was besotted with the license afforded by fiction and the social critique permitted only by comedy. Read this witty, wildly inventive work and how conservative, how painfully corseted so much modern fiction will suddenly seem. -- Parul Sehgal, 'Times Critics' Top Books of 2020' - The New York Times One of the wittiest, most playful, and therefore most alive and ageless books ever written. -- Dave Eggers The book's invigorating style, as much as its backdrop of racial and social injustice, makes it ideal reading for this morbid, insurgent summer... Sprinkled with epigrams, dreams, gags and asides, the story teases, dances and delights... [Machado']s worldly, bruised voice reaches out to touch readers today with its rueful comedy and wry sensuality. -- The Economist A great ironist, a tragic comedian... In [De Assis] books, in their most comic moments, he underlines the suffering by making us laugh. -- Philip Roth The greatest writer ever produced in Latin America. -- Susan Sontag

Author Information

Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis (1839–1908) was born in Rio de Janeiro and, as well as his seven short-story collections, wrote such groundbreaking novels as Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas, Dom Casmurro, Quincas Borba and The Alienist. Margaret Jull Costa, who has translated Javier Marías and José Saramago, lives in England. Robin Patterson has translated José Luandino Vieira and lives in England.  

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