Onça Caetana

Ariano Suassuna ́s father was assassinated for political issues when Ariano was still

a child. His mother was persecuted and forced to move away with her children several times. This event is pivotal in the author ́s works and this is why it is the starting point of the exhibition. The Onça Caetana is one of the forms adopted by death in Ariano ́s fictional universe, and is derived from “Caetana”, a name that the country people habitually use to refer to death, depicting it as a young woman (“the young woman, Caetana”). Ariano drew several versions of the caetana and this one was chosen to be shown in three dimensions at this exhibition. The piece was produced in Belo Horizonte by puppeteers Agnaldo Souza Pinho, Carla Grossi, Lia Moreira and Pedro Rolim.

A ACAUHAN — A MALHADA DA ONÇA

Here lived a King when I was a boy:

he wore gold and brown in his doublet.

Lucky stone over my Destiny,

pulsated, next to mine, his Heart.

For me, his singing was divine,

when, through sound of the Viola and bourdon,

sang, in a hoarse voice, Confusion,

the Blood, the laughter and the deaths of the Sertão.

But they killed my father. Since that day,

I saw myself, Blind without my Guide,

who went to the Sun, transfigured.

His Effigy burns me. I am the Prey,

He, the Ember that impels to the Fire, lit,

Golden sword in bloody pasture.

LÁPIDE — FINAL “A DESCOBERTO”

When I die, don't let go of my Horse

on the stones of my Burnt-Pasture:

lash him with his speared Back,

with the Golden Spur, until you kill him.

One of my Sons shall ride it,

in a Saddle of greenish leather,

that drags, through the stony and brown ground,

Copper plates, bells and clappers.

Thus, with Thunderbolt and Copper-struck,

troop of Hoofs, blood of the Brown,

perhaps the sound of molten gold is pretended,

that in vain — Foolish and vagrant blood —

I tried to forge, in my Strange-singing,

to the skin of my Beast and the sun of the World.