The limits of the theory of post-autonomy in front of the literary manifestations of the Brazilian peripheries of São Paulo

Abstract

There is currently a consensus among certain literary critics that many texts that currently form part of contemporary Brazilian literature pay testament to the end of literary ‘autonomy’. They argue that such texts deploy language that expands beyond the printed word and utilize formats that move beyond the physical entity of the book, thereby challenging the very theory of a literary field. This article questions that hypothesis, arguing that these critics turn a blind eye (intentionally or otherwise) to a number of works produced on the urban periphery. These works show that there is a limit to the absence of limits in the field, a limit that responds to the failure to go beyond a homogenous group of writers and artists, result of a fixed ideological view about what is or is not literature. At the same time, via an analysis of novels written by Ferréz and several publications that have arisen out of the poetry soirees (saraus) that take place on the outskirts of São Paulo, this article highlights the benefits of discussing these texts in terms of the notion of post-autonomy.