“Travelling in the Family”: Elizabeth Bishop’s Brazilian Autobiographical Voice

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to analyze Bishop’s interest in Brazilian autobiographical works especially The Diary of Helena Morley and poems by Carlos Drummond de Andrade that she translated into English and included among her own poems. Of particular interest is the privileged dialogue established between these translations and Bishop’s own autobiographical texts, either in verse or in prose, both published and unpublished during her lifetime. Particular attention is paid to the treatment of oblivion defined as both forgetfulness and omission. Oblivion strikes as the “vivid force” that shapes most of these autobiographical works and pushes both poets to explore their childhood “tropisms,” that is to say, according to Sarraute’s definition, micro-movements, intimate dramas that affect the child’s subconscious and that the adult tries to grasp at years later through uncertain language. The aim of the autobiographical return is not to recreate a whole life but to retrieve the emotional traces left by a few episodes.

Keywords

• Elizabeth Bishop
• Carlos Drummond de Andrade
• translation
• intertextuality
• autobiography
• childhood