The fruit of disenchantment: suicide and alienation in Michel Laub's A maçã envenenada

Abstract

This article proposes to read Michel Laub's novel A maçã envenenada (The poisoned apple, 2013) as an allegory of post-transitional Brazil. Using the themes of suicide and tragedy (as a synonym of calamity) as thematic anchors, the essay reads Laub's text as an allegory of defeat (Avelar, 1999). This allegorical portrayal suggests the end of a sense of collectivity and, in general terms, the demise of social and political utopias in post-transitional Brazil. The article thus proposes that, in Laub's novel, the trope of suicide allegorizes the "defeat" of social and political utopias as a result not only of the dictatorship, but also of the problematic transition to democracy and finally of the country's social and political reality after the democratization.

Keywords: suicide, tragedy, politics, Michel Laub.