To Beat or Abet in Machado De Assis's "Pai Contra Mãe": The Text in Superposition

Abstract

In Machado de Assis's "Pai contra mãe," the first of Cândido Neves's many aborted professions – typesetting – takes on an unexpectedly clairvoyant dimension when one considers a critical textual variant: the addition of a cedilha to a pivotal word in some editions of the story. When we review this typographical discrepancy in light of the context of race relations and slavery in Machado's prose fiction, it not only becomes a microcosm of the contrapuntal nature of "Pai contra mãe," but it also serves as an avatar for the importance of reader engagement in the central ambiguity of Machado's best work.