Conservatism and Critical Boldness

In this book I analyse two novels by authors from different literary fields, although similar in terms of broader political issues in their respective countries: Machado de Assis’s Esaú e Jacó and Dostoevsky’s Os Demônios. The former problematises and questions the change of political regime in Brazil from the monarchy to the republic, showing how the intellectual environment was affected by the political framework. The second, in turn, criticises the sudden changes made by the aristocracy, as well as combating the modernising wave coming from Western Europe. In The Devils, the theme of the novel is the revolutionary movements with a socialist slant and, in this context, it also deals with themes related to nihilism and the dangers of a collapse of Russian tradition. The intellectual environment is also thematised, including implicit and direct attacks on certain authors.