A máquina do mundo by Paulo José Miranda: The Vertiginous Thanatology in its mechanisms

Abstract

Aimless wandering, exile and the precariousness of collective manners of living in the modern world are the narrative constructs employed by Paulo José Miranda in A máquina do mundo to deal with themes such as violence and authoritarianism. The unreal atmosphere and vertiginous gameplay of the action video games present in the novel constitute, using paradox and parody, an exercise in thanatology and a possible use of the narrative conventions of mass-appeal films to create a cultural alternative which disputes the significance of the present. The novel ruthlessly erases the boundaries of genre –from philosophical reflection to melodrama and from the complexities of detective fiction to the grotesque; it suspends the norms of literary discourse and opens the way for the peculiar and confusing fear of the ways in which life and memory are destroyed in modern times.