“O PESCADOR CEGO” (1988) AND THE STRATEGIES OF CONSTITUTING THE UNUSUAL IN THE STORY OF MIA COUTO

Abstract

: “O pescador cego”, a short story by the Mozambican writer Mia Couto, provokes estrangement in the reader through an unusual narrative that erupts from the daily lives of characters embedded in a plot apparently circumscribed by Cartesian reality. In this work, the author utilizes a heterodiegetic narrator as an aesthetic resource; consequently, the narrative perspective is external to the plot. However, this external observer insists on drawing closer to the object of his report through philosophical reflections and questioning that guide the reader’s gaze toward an understanding of certain actions of the characters, unraveling cultural symbols and behaviors while anticipating significations. Wittmann (2012) observes that when referring to the fantastic and the magical, one is addressing a Western perspective, since in African culture, the supernatural is regarded as natural. Paradiso (2015) evaluates that, regarding African literature, certain phenomena – even those considered absurd, unusual, or impossible by other civilizations – are common and immanent to the perceptions of the real; that is, the animist reality. With this in mind, this analysis of the short story “O pescador cego”, by Mia Couto, aims to identify the set of strategies for composing the unusual within the core of this narrative, in order to compare it with other theoretical conceptions of similar aesthetic forms in Western literature. It observes the differences and similarities between narrative resources, as well as discusses the concepts of the fantastic, the marvelous, and the magical, counterpointing them with the idea of animist realism proposed by African writers and critics.