The slow and frantic action in lyric novels by Vergílio Ferreira
Abstract
The action of the lyrical novels by Vergílio Ferreira, a Portuguese author of the 20th century, is in the mind above all, it is thoughts. The action that takes place in the present moment is slow, almost insignificant and almost nonexistent. It can only last a few hours. Indeed, there will be no beginning, middle and end, nor a climax, as might be expected by the reader. In each novel, it will be a short period of time where there is only one character who interacts with himself, in his intimacy, at a burial, at a funeral, or arriving home. In an external calm of a slow action in the present moment, a frantic thinking is triggered and flows throughout the novel. An unstoppable mental action that runs through all the meanders of the vergilian “I” existence contrasts with the fixed image observed by that same “I” and the slowness of any movement.
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