Novelas of Minho is my first taste of Portugal’s most prolific writer, Camilo Castelo Branco. Living in the 19th century he published an outstanding 260 novels. He was considered a Romantic writer and lived roughly around the time of Eça de Queiroz. One can say they took different sides in their styles.
O Filho Natural (Natural Son) and Maria Moysés (Maria Moses) are two short novelas contained in this book from the Leopold Classic Library. As noted on the back, Leopold scans old books and prints them in this large format. This book was published in 1903 although the original stories were published in 1875-77.
Natural Son tells the sad tale of Thomazia, daughter of the local pharmacist, who is abandoned by her lover Vasco Merrameque so he can climb the social ladder. She gives birth to a boy Alvaro just as her father dies. She inherits his business but it is challenging to make ends meet. She sends her child away to Brazil thanks to the help of a local abby. Vasco marries to become a viscount. One day Alvaro, now a young man, returns home. Kind of a revenge tale.
Maria Moses is a take on the religious story of Moses, who as a baby was set in a basket to drift away from his parent’s digressions. Maria is saved and brought up by peasants. She in turn runs an orphanage for abandoned children. Life is hard but the resolution was predictable but poignant.
I found a strong sentimentality in his writing style. Castelo Branco was well-educated and often tossed in many literary references from Horace and Homer to contemporary Portuguese writers. He captured the rural people as hard working while the upper society ran the show. Here society’s indiscretions were taken out on the rural people as revealed in these two stories. Perhaps he did side with the simple folk? Or chastised his own society?
A little moralizing, some challenged people, some good but predictable outcomes made for some enjoyable reading. Good but not great. Enjoyable. 3.5 stars.
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