Civilização e narrativa de contrastes em A Cidade e as Serras, de Eça de Queirós.

Abstract

With the great scientific and technological advances arising from the Second Industrial Revolution (second half of the XIX century), the concept of civilization, judging by what can be read in A Cidade e as Serras, by Eça de Queirós, becomes associated with industrial progress, an example occurred in Paris. From this thought, a certain devaluation towards individuals and peasant life is preconceived, in principle, when compared to city life. In this scenario, large urban centers were regarded as synonymous with progress and happiness, while the field was associated with backwardness and lack of intelligence. In this work, our main objective was to analyze the work cited above, as a way of exposing the contrast between what is inferred from it by civilization and nature, related to the universe of representation of values attributed to the field and the city, in order to collaborate for the deconstruction of the former's deterministic view of inferiority. Therefore, we base this research mainly on the knowledge of Rousseau (2004), Fortes (1996), Batista (2015) and Moisés (2018). As an analysis methodology, this is a bibliographical research with a qualitative approach and explanatory character, considering that we seek to analyze and expose the vision of the countryside/city axis in the period of the second industrial revolution. As a result of the research, we conclude that the view of the inferiority of the countryside compared to the city is based on a misguided basis, since it is distorted due to theories that influenced the literary movement, such as determinism, still in force in the school literary Realism. The distancing of the character Jacinto concerning his own lands is what made him, despite being competent and literate, complete unrelated to the reality in which he is invited to participate, which will change after his move from Paris to Tormes, in Portugal.