Irony and tenderness: an analysis of “O meu guri”, by Chico Buarque

Abstract

This paper presents an analysis of the song “O meu guri”, by Chico Buarque. Its theoretical guidance is the notion of irony as discourse relationship between what is said and what is implicit – according to Linda Hutcheon’s reflections on irony in post-modern art – as well as the dialogic relationship between author-creator, author-contemplator and character, by Mikhail Bakhtin. As the lyrics of a song form a lyrical discourse, I propose to call “poet-creator” the subject of the poetic act of utterance; “poet-contemplator”, the subject of the new act of utterance (reading), as the reader who has the ability to perceive irony by recreating the aesthetic object expressed by the poem; and “lyrical self”, the subject of the utterance within the poem. Based on such distinctions, I analyse irony as the effect resulting of the surplus of vision of the author-creator and the authorcontemplator with regard to the lyrical self. Keywords: Chico Buarque; “O meu guri”; Mikhail Bakhtin; author-creator; author-contemplator; Lyrical self.