to the dogs (2)
by Douglas Messerli
Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis Quincas Borba (Rio de Janeiro: Pariz.
H.Garnier, 1892), translated from the Portuguese by Clotilde Wilson as Philosopher or Dog? (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux/Noonday
Press, 1954)
Although near death, Borba suddenly determines to travel from his home
in Barbacena to Rio de Janeiro to take care of business affairs, leaving the
care of his dog, whom Quincas Borba has named after himself, to Rubião. After
several weeks, the friend receives a letter from the philosopher, wherein Borba
claims to be Saint Augustine, and a week later the old man dies, willing his
entire estate—along with the care of his dog—to his disciple.
Although Rubião may not thoroughly comprehend the teachings of the
philosopher, I have chosen the word “disciple” because the meandering plot that
follows makes it clear that the author is in some manner retelling the story of
Quincas Borba—detailing his descent from sanity to lunacy—in the tales of
Rubião and his adventures in the great capitol city that follow.
Machado de Assis’ novel is nearly overstuffed with humanity
representing, in one form or another, the principles of “Humanitism,”
characters fighting for survival and dominance, most often at the one another’s
expense. On the train to Rio, Rubião meets a young couple, the predominant
figures in his series of adventures, an intelligent young man, Christiano de
Almeida e Palha, and his young wife Sophia. Enchanted with the meek and quiet
Sophia and her exuberant, young husband, Rubião readily tells them of his newfound
wealth and reveals his plans. The man is so disarmingly innocent that Palha
warns him not to tell his affairs to strangers: “Discretion and kind faces
don’t always go together.”
Indeed, they do not! For, although Rubião quickly makes friends with the
couple, and as a regular visitor in their house, is soon asked for loans of
money, requests he is only too ready to grant. The seemingly shy woman is
revealed as a flirtatious wife, fully aware of her own beauty and only too
ready to use it in conquering the hearts of the males she encounters, including
Rubião. In his innocence, however, he confuses cultural flirtatiousness with
romance, and crosses the line by admitting his love to Sophia, who responds
with distressed shock. The friendship between the couple and Rubião soon
resumes, in part, because the young Palha is still in his debt. An even closer
relationship soon develops as Rubião becomes a partner in Palha’s new importing
business.
Rubião has also made friends with Dr. Camacho, a politician/journalist
whose politics seems to consist of being on the right side of every cause. He
too is happy to consort with the new visitor to the city, particularly since
Rubião is only too happy to fund his newspaper. Others avow friendship,
rewarded with nightly gatherings at Rubião’s house with lavish meals and drink.
Sophia attempts to marry her cousin, now living with her and Palha, to
Rubião without success; ironically she is now courted at the dinner event by
Carlos Maria, a young man far more handsome than Rubião, whose proclamations of
love to Sophia are received far differently from the older man’s. But Carlos
Maria, unlike the smitten Rubião, is not truly in love with anyone except
himself; his marriage to Sophia’s cousin, Maria Benedicta, is perfect, for she
has such low self-esteem that she is quite willing to serve as a submissive
wife and accept his common outbursts of dissatisfaction with her and their life
together.
Meanwhile, Palha, who now serves as executor to Rubião’s finances, is
increasingly impatient with the man’s readiness to give away his fortune,
including gifts of jewelry to his own wife. As Palha becomes more and more
successful—despite the fact that he has still not repaid his own debt to
Rubião—he ends their partnership, perhaps so that he will not have share his
own wealth. The nightly dinners at Rubião’s home continue, despite the fact
that the host is often late or absent from the events. Just as Rubião has been
misled in affairs of the heart with Sophia and others, so is he misled in
politics by Camacho, who insists that Rubião will soon be elected to government
office. In short, ideas of grandeur gradually expand in Rubião’s mind, as he
begins gradually to lose his sense of perspective, harboring a suspicion that
Quincas Borba, the philosopher, may actually reside in the dog for whom he has
become the guardian.
Numerous other characters come and go in Rubião’s increasingly frenetic
life—figures who, like nearly all the Rio de Janeiro citizens the author
presents, struggle for what Quincas Borba has described as “the potatoes” of
life, not only the true necessities but what they mistakenly perceive as
necessary for their pleasures—money, love, class, power. Is it any wonder that
Rubião, who has been only generous and open in all his relationships, should
also desire these things?
Convinced he is Napoleon III, Rubião alternates between moments of
sanity and utter lunacy, ultimately going along the streets greeting his
imaginary subjects, followed by gangs of mocking children, including a young
boy whose life he once saved from being overrun by a carriage. Given the
behavior of the humans into which he has been thrown, Rubião, like the
philosopher before him, becomes “someone else,” a being at war with the world
about him.
Now without money, Rubião has little to offer his former friends, who
half-heartedly (the easily distracted and comically portrayed Dona Fernanda
being, perhaps, the one exception) seek treatment for him; but as he comes
close to being cured, Rubião determines to return to his old home in Barbacena,
where the “fever” once more overcomes him. Although he has taken in by an old
friend, he dies laughing: “To the victor, the potatoes!” The dog—or is he,
after all, the true philosopher, himself seeking attention and love—dies three
days later in the street.
Machado de Assis’s brilliant satire is at once a loving acceptance of
the condition of man, and a somewhat cynical view of mankind’s intentions. As
the author, himself, explains the apparent contradiction: “The Southern Cross,
which the beautiful Sophia would not gaze upon as Rubião begged her to do, is
too high in the heavens to distinguish between man’s laughter and tears.”
Los Angeles, August 20, 2006
Reprinted from EXPLORINGfictions (June 2009).
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