Abstract
After the proclamation of the Republic, regulations for civil marriage became a recurring issue in the national press. Turning marriage into a state contract meant establishing rights and duties for men and women as spouses or parents. In this way, the country regulated the private family life as a whole. In the 1890s, these discussions occupied the Brazilian press. At the time, Machado regularly published a column entitled "A Semana" in Gazeta de Notícias, in which this topic was given priority. Studying these texts is fundamental for understanding the new social configurations in post-proclamation-of-the-Republic private life, especially because of the possibility of understanding them together with Machado's work, which always focused on the social role of marriage.
chronicle; gender; Machado de Assis; marriage