O mar como metáfora nos romances Mar morto e O velho e o mar e na peça teatral Riders to the sea

Abstract

The present work is a study in Comparative Literature which analyses the sea as metaphor in the Brazilian novel, Mar Morto, by Jorge Amado, The Old Man and the Sea (O Velho e o Mar) by the American novelist, Ernest Hemingway, as well as in the one-act play by Irish dramatist, John Millington Synge, Riders to the Sea (no translation available in Portuguese). With the principal focus on Mar Morto, this study considers the sea as an element which provokes different attitudes in the masculine and feminine characters of the three literary works. The relationship of the mariners of Bahia to the sea is compared to that of Santiago, the old man of Hemingway’s novel: these men admire and love the sea, which they consider as the dominant feminine force in their lives and the source of their religious belief. The women’s relationship to the sea is very different. In comparing the attitude of the feminine characters in Mar Morto and Riders to the Sea, one can readily observe that the mothers, daughters, wives and lovers of those whose life is irrevocably linked to the sea, consider it to be an enemy which robs them of the love and support which is provided for them by their men. There is in these women, however, a strange resignation to their fate, and when death occurs at sea, they weep and lament, but finally accept the role which destiny has assigned them.