“É de humanidade que sofro”: uma análise sobre o sujeito contemporâneo a partir da obra “O Natimorto: um musical silencioso” de Lourenço Mutarelli

Abstract

This work aims to make an analysis of the novel O Natimorto: um musical silencioso (2009) by Lourenço Mutarelli. In the plot, The Agent, fascinated by the singing of the character The Voice, presents it to The Wife, who ridicules them both for valuing silence as a talent, just as The Conductor will do, since the singer’s voice does not produce any sound when she sings. Tired of the frustrations, aggressions and humiliations of work and marriage, The Agent proposes to the Voice an isolated life, enclosing himself in a hotel room where he would enjoy each other’s company, he would read the fortunes of the days through the images on cigarette packets, and she would sing for him, the only one who could take advantage of the artist’s unusual talent. However, his plan fails, since The Voice does not follow exactly what he intended, causing his attempt to deny the impulses of desire, of wanting, to be frustrated, leading him to a complete surrender to selfishness, envy, and cruelty. Through a comparative analysis of elements belonging to the fields of literature, philosophy, and psychoanalysis, this study seeks to investigate the interaction between tarot, contemporary subjectivity, and literary discourse in the context of late capitalism. To this end, we will use the theoretical contributions of Karl Erik Schøllhammer, Byung-Chul Han and Maria Rita Kehl to understand how the self-imposed isolation and extreme violence of The Agent and the new tarot arcana, produced by the images of the verses on the cigarette packets as allegorical literary productions of contemporary subjectivity in a capitalist world.