A narrativa de “Selva Trágica†(2011), de Hernâni Donato, é situada na fronteira
Brasil-Paraguai, ao sudeste do atual Mato Grosso do Sul, e, num hÃbrido de romance e
relato, narra a saga de personagens oprimidos pela Companhia Mate Laranjeira, empresa
de exploração de erva-mate, que possuÃa o monopólio dos ervais brasileiros e paraguaios e
recrutava trabalhadores de ambos os lados da fronteira para que trabalhassem em regime
semi-escravo enquanto interessasse à Companhia. Considera-se, para os fins deste estudo,
que a opressão imposta suprimia também as identidades e valores nacionais das
personagens, sem considerar a hibridez daquele espaço, de forma que às personagens não
restava outra escolha senão negociar as diferenças e que esta negociação se dava,
principalmente, por meio da linguagem. Nesse sentido, este artigo visa refletir sobre a
negociação das identidades e valores culturais nacionais decorrentes da opressão sofrida
pelos personagens advindos destes dois paÃses diferentes – Brasil e Paraguai –, o que torna
o espaço diegético um entre-lugar, conforme proposto por Homi Bhabha (2010).
The novel Selva Trágica (2011), by Hernâni Donato, occurs on the borderline
between Brazil and Paraguay, at the Southeast of what is today Mato Grosso do Sul, and
mixing novel and reporting, tells the story of characters oppressed by a hierba-matte
Company, well known in Brazil as Companhia Mate Laranjeira, that used to own the
monopoly of the hierba-matte sources in Brazil as well as in Paraguay, and recruited workers
from both sides of the borderline to work on a semi slave regime as long as it was part of the
Company‟s interests. For the aims of this study, it is considered that the oppression imposed
to the characters also suppressed the national identities and values, without considering the
hybridity of such space, in a way that there was no other choice to the characters but to
negotiate their differences through language. Hence, this paper aims to reflect about the
negotiation of national identity and cultural values that occurs due to the oppression suffered
by characters from these two different countries – Brazil and Paraguay –, fact that makes the
narrative space an in-between-place, as stated by Homi Bhabha (2010).
