Reading Angola Margarida Calafate Ribeiro e Laura Cavalcante Padilha (eds.) Edições Afrontamento (2008) さReading Angola coalesce a set of essays involving two groups of actors: aesthetic producers and literary critics in Angola, notably writers, national and international critics, predominantly of Portuguese language. The book is partitioned into two parts: ´Reading Angola through the voice of its writers´, with texts of Boaventura Cardoso, Manuel Rui, José Luandino Vieira, Ana Paula Tavares and Ondjaki. The second, ´Reading Angola through critical reflections´, features Laura Cavalcante Padilha, Inocência Mata, Luís Kandjimbo, José Pires Laranjeira, Tania Macêdo, Carmen Lucia Tindó Secco, Élida Lauris, Roberto Vecchi and Margarida Calafate Ribeiro. Reading Angola is about testing the boundaries of deliberation; catalyzing and encouraging deeper reflections on the different readings in the Angolan literature about the tensions and contradictions of our times and the ghosts inhabiting these spaces.ざ 1 2 3 4 5 6 BOOK REVIEWS Reading Angola Margarida Calafate Ribeiro e Laura Cavalcante Padilha (eds.) Edições Afrontamento (2008) 2009 - Andrea Cristina Muraro, Revista Crioula, November, 6. 2008 - Mary L. Daniel, Luso-Brazilian Review, 47, 251-253. 7 ! # $ ( ) * 2 0 % #& ' + 0 , " * 6/ 0 7 / " 4 *# 1 5 . 7 ! . * 8 . : * $ # ) 3 * 9 2 - . * . " <== / ; 9 ! + > ' -,#/ . 1 % / ? / /) 8 ! . 8 & * 8 * @ 9 A @ ) . A B /CDE/ ; . 7 1 * 9 9 ! . . ! ! 9 .9 8 7 . 1 F ' 7 ! % @ * ! A B / GE/ ; 7 . " 3 * 7 @+ 0 H . F 0 7 A* ! 9 . 8 * ) ' * CDGI* / & 7 1 @ . 9 /# A B / E * " 1. 1. / . * " ) ' ) *. 5 . * 4 ) . # @) * 0 9 ! A . 9 J4HHH/ * . * ! * . ! " . 7 @ . * . B /KKE/ + " @ * 1 / * 7 * # * ! ! . 1 . 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' . 1 " ' . @ A * 1 * . .9 ' " & ' ! ) @ A/ " # $% & # , ) -. * ' + %()% ! * / 0 + 1 12 Book Reviews 251 Moutinbo's critical approach relies predominantly on structuralist, formalist and narratological frameworks of close reading, whilst also drawing more selectively on Memory Studies and postcolonialism. The insights provided by the narratological close reading of the texts are certainly to be commended. It would, bowever, have been interesting to see a clearer integration of this textual exegesis with the use made of postcolonial theory, regarding which the author seems rather ambivalent. On tbe one band postcolonialism is rigbtly challenged in so far as it risks privileging the post- (or incipiently neo-) imperial perspective of the ex-colonizer, if the historical power differentials separating colonizer and colonized are not sufficiently emphasized. On the other hand, many aspects of postcolonial theory, including some seminal texts on lusophone culture by Sousa Santos, Medeiros, Veccbi and Vale de Almeida, are drawn upon by way of situating tbe book's structuralist and formalist readings in historically and culturally specific terms. An unavoidable challenge tbat tbis volume faces is, as the author acknowledges, the fact that four of its six chapters cover texts also discussed in Margarida Calafate Ribeiro's excellent, book-length study, Uma Historia de Regressos. Imperio, Guerra Colonial e Pós-Colonialismo (Porto: Ediçôes Afrontamento, 2004). Moutinho's decision to focus specifically on questions of memory helps to mark out important, distinctive territory in this respect. The Colonial Wars in Contemporary Portuguese Fiction is very well written and accessible. It makes a valuable addition to the growing body of work on Colonial War memory and trauma, particularly in tbe undergraduate teaching context, as well as providing illuminating introductory commentaries for the informed general reader. Hilary Owen University of Manchester, UK Padilha, Laura Cavalcante and Margarida Calafate Ribeiro, orgs. Lendo Angola. Porto: Ediçôes Afrontamento, 2008.199 pp. Lendo Angola brings togetber a series of fourteen papers presented during the seminar on Angolan literature held in June, 2007, at the Centro de Estudos Sociais of the University of Coimbra under the auspices of the Gulbenkian Foundation and the Fundaçâo para a Ciencia e Tecnologia and organized by Margarida Calafate Ribeiro. Its stated purpose is to stimulate dialogue among Angolan writers, national critics, and foreign commentators with a view to broadening the philosophical base on which future readings and reflections on the Angolan literary system may rest and from which they may be enricbed. This book is divided into two main sections: Tbe first, "Lendo Angola pelas Vozes dos Seus Escritores," offers essays by Angolan autbors Boaventura Cardoso ("A Escrita Literaria de um Contador Africano"), Manuel Rui ("Eu e o 13 252 Luso-Brazilian Review 47:] Outro — O invasor ou em poucas très linhas uma maneira de pensar o texto"), José Luandino Vieira ("Literatura Angolana: estoriando a partir do que nâo se vé"), Ana Paula Tavares ("Contar Historias"), and Ondjaki ('"As Raízes do Arco-iris', ou O Camaleâo que gostava de frequentar desertos"). The second (and longer) section, "Lendo Angola pelas Reflexôes Criticas," is comprised of essays by critics Laura Cavalcante Padilba ("Literatura Angolana, suas Cartografias e seus Embates contra a Colonialidade" — a broad spectrum, with special emphasis on the fiction of Arnaldo Santos and Luandino Vieira), Inocencia Mata ("Narrando a Naçâo: da retórica anticolonial â escrita da historia" — focus on Pepetela), Luís Kandjimbo ("Os Itinerarios da Identidade Individual de Agostinho Neto, um poeta da Geraçâo Literaria de 40"), Pires Laranjeira ("Leonel Cosme: um romance sobre a Independencia de Angola na perspectiva dos brancos no Sul"), Tania Macedo ("Os Anos de Pólvora: narrativas sobre a guerra na ficçâo angolana contemporánea" — emphasis on Pepetela, Boaventura Cardoso, Luandino Vieira, and Ruy Duarte de Carvalho), Carmen Lucia Tindó Secco ("Entre Passos e Descompassos, a Alquimia e a Resistencia do Canto — reflexôes sobre a poesia angolana boje" — focus on Joâo Melo, Lopito Feijóo, José Luís Mendonça, and Ana Paula Tavares), Elida Lauris ("Literatura e Direito: pluralismo jurídico em Grande Sertäo: Veredas e Luuanda" — contrast of typical legal processes in the Brazilian sertäo and and an Angolan musseque as depicted in GS:V and "Estória da galinha e do ovo"), Roberto Vecchi ("Choques e Poéticas In-betweeness nos Atlánticos Sul: modernidades em tránsito na formaçâo da poesia angolana"), and Margarida Calafate Ribeiro (Um Desafio a Partir do Sul: uma historia de literatura outra"). A short biographical section on participating authors and.critics closes the volume. Thefiveauthor-commentators comprising the first quarter of the book offer an interesting collage of reminiscences of personal creative patterns, pre- and post-colonial Angolan literary developments and available publishing opportunities (e.g., editorial houses or the lack thereof), and the relationship between the oral and written word within the Angolan literary context. Responding to the implicit question of "When was Angolan literature really born?," José Luandino Vieira offers the hypothesis of "black boles" in Angolan letters — sucb as personal correspondence and ecclesiastical-historical writings dating back to tbe XVI century — tbat need to be taken into account, wbile Ana Paula Tavares takes up the issue of historical timeliness of literary works, especially those of Pepetela, Mario Antonio, Uanhenga Xitu, Manuel Rui, and Lopito Feijóo. In the volume's section of critical essays, there is considerable variation in quality and originality. Among the most original and thought-provoking essays are those of Carmen Lucia Tindó Secco, Elida Lauris, Margarida Calafate Ribeiro, and most especially Roberto Vecchi. Applying theories of Gramsci, Bhabba, Deleuze, and Gasparini, Vecchi seeks to differentiate the various "Modernismos" occurring nearly simultaneously in Brazil during the first third of the XX century and discern the degree to which each of these found reso- 14 Book Reviews 253 nance and acceptance by Angolan poets of the same generations, especially writers of the "Vamos descobrir Angola!" movement. And Margarida Calafate Ribeiro's final essay seeks to set the stage for further critical investigation of the many new perspectives opened by the fourteen preceding writers, offering fitting closure to Lendo Angola. In spite of the diversity of subjects and authors treated in this volume, it is characterized on the whole by a pleasant air of collegiality and common interest. Its publication is timely, and I recommend it especially to persons wishing to gain a heightened appreciation of the multifaceted and multi-genred nature of Angolan literature produced since the mid-XX century as well as its antecedents. Mary L. Daniel University of Wisconsin-Madison Hendrik Kraay, Race, State, and Armed Forces in Independence-Era Brazil: Bahia 1790s -1840s. Stanford: Stanford UP, 2001. Kraay has taken on large, complicated, intertwined issues seeking to use the military as a vehicle to study race and the formation of Bahia's provincial society in the decades prior to and after Brazilian independence. Just one of these topics would be a major endeavor, seeking to tie them together was a difficult task. What role did race play in provincial military affairs? Kraay suggests that race as a stimulus for rebellion was weak in Bahia's post-colonial tri-racial society of blacks, pardos, and whites. Of course, slavery cut across such divisions, as did the complexity of skin tones and social-economic status. It was easier in the colonial era to specify race, but even then one's status, connections, or employment might play a role in determining one's perceived race. Kraay's locus is Salvador, Bahia, only rarely does he refer to other places. Travelers have long commented on the darkness of Salvador's population. It is a pity that he did not begin this study before the Vice-regal capital was transferred to Rio de Janeiro in 1763, because it would have given a firmer base-line to understanding Brazil's military history. His provincial perspective allows him to examine the anxious tension that occurred when Crown Prince Pedro declared independence in 1822. Should Bahia maintain its loyalty to Lisbon or follow Rio de Janeiro? The answer was not a foregone conclusion, although most textbook accounts seemingly assume that it was. Kraay sees the legacy of the independence era's militarization in the "rounds of seditions, social unrest, and political upheaval between 1824 and 1838" (p. 30). Such a perspective makes Brazil's experience in those years more comparable to that of Spanish American countries. He devotes several chapters to aspects of the Portuguese imperial regime, the collapse of the colonial military between 1820 and 1825, and the concurrent 15