The Jewish Amazon by Moacyr Scliar: The Word of the Other as Affirmation of the Noncoincidence of the Other in Oneself

Abstract

By analyzing two of Moacyr Scliar’s novels, Cenas da vida minúscula [Scenes of a Minuscule Life] and A Majestade do Xingu [Xingu’s Magesty], this paper proposes a trajectory of risk and acknowledgment of the word of the other in permanent transit, for possibly affirming the Jewish imaginary, with the Amazon as background for highly inventive plots by the “gaucho” (from Rio Grande do Sul) writer. In both novels, there are powerful orchestrating voices, capable of producing labyrinthine dialogical excavations.1 Such voices refer to the production of several possibilities of affirming the assimilated voice of the other, evoking the projective force of devouring the literary perspective proposed. Understanding the assimilation of the word of the other becomes an essential instrument to contact the complexity of the formation and foundation of many ethnicities that intersected in Brazil.