Murdered Women: Politics and Literary Representation in Portugal and Brazil
In this course we will study the tragic history of three women ordered to be executed by political chiefs for political reasons. The course's aim is twofold: to analyze, in their historical frameworks, the political ideologies used to justify the women's murders, and to examine through textual analysis how these events are represented in fictional and non-fictional literature. The women are Inês de Castro (1320-1355), the lover of the Portuguese Prince Pedro; Olga Benario (1908-1942), the Jewish-German wife of the Brazilian communist leader Luís Carlos Prestes; and Elza Fernandes (1918-1934), the girlfriend of a high member of the communist party in Brazil. Inês was killed because her imminent marriage to Pedro could have rendered Portugal politically unstable. Olga died in a Nazi concentration camp, to which she was sent by Prestes' enemy Getúlio Vargas, then President of Brazil. Elza was accused of political betrayal and eventually murdered by communist party members, with the support of Luís Carlos Prestes. Readings will include poetry, a biography, and a historical novel. (PGSE 0215 or equivalent) 3hrs. lect./disc.