Discursos acerca do corpo envelhecido e percepção de si no romance Memórias de minhas putas tristes

Abstract

The target of this study is the novel Memories of my melancholy whores, the last work of fiction of the Colombian Gabriel García Marquez. Through the novel, the goal is to analyze discourses about body and self-perception. The chosen conception of body here, aligned with self-perception, relates to an understanding of body different from that of the Cartesian model that postulates a division between body and soul, as if the subject were created in an unsurmountable duality; the theoretical model followed in this study seeks for an idea of existence and apprehension of world that, inescapably, goes through the route of corporality: becoming a subject requires body experimentations. In this novel it is portrayed an aged body, with all its particularities, since the narrator, who is also the main character (not named), begins the story on the eve of his ninety-year-old birthday. Within this perspective, four discursive axis relating to the body have been observed along with their correspondent fields of knowledge. The first one, entitled The biological exams upon the body, is tied to medicine and health sciences, and analyzes the positions and practices that legitimates the establishment of criteria of normality referring to the subject; the second one, Awkwardness regarding self-image, is based on psychoanalysis and discusses the image the individual makes of himself through his self-perception and contact with the environment, considering his peers and the spaces he joins; the third one, Virility as a sexuality and identity component, relates mostly to the uncertainty of the phallic potential, which leads to questioning about sexuality and status as a man, and it is linked to gender studies; finally, Power as a body control mechanism, relates to bio political issues and seeks to perceive how work and productivity requirements regulate practices, besides other ways to manage life. It is possible to recognize that the aged body is brought to a place beyond standard, featured for a non-correspondence to culture expectations. However, there are also resistance expressions that reject this attribution, perceived in the subject’s practices that somehow deny the role that is brought upon him.