This paper presents an analysis of "A sonâmbula" (1878), one of the first brief pieces of theater published by Machado de Assis in the pages of the newspaperO Cruzeiro. The study of the dynamic interaction between the author and the circumstances of the periodical’s production allows the identification of traces of his signature in collective editorial projects and the creative results derived from the appropriation of the set of discourses, codes and signs that formed the culture of his time. The dominant style of the material submitted to the journal consists of humor, parody, formal experimentation and critical irreverence – the aspects that would place Machado’s literature in the tradition of Menippean satire. Therefore, the analysis of this narrative intends to demonstrate that the newspaper O Cruzeiro asserts itself as a mediator and supporter, par excellence, of the experimental exercises that resulted in the transformation of Machado de Assis’s creative practice at the end of the 1870s.
Machado de Assis; O Cruzeiro; "A sonâmbula"; humor; parody
