Barren Lives (Texas Pan American Series) [Paperback]

Graciliano Ramos (Author), Charles Umlauf (Illustrator), Ralph Edward Dimmick (Translator)

Book Description

Series: Texas Pan American Series | Publication Date: 1971

A peasant family, driven by the drought, walks to exhaustion through an arid land. As they shelter at a deserted ranch, the drought is broken and they linger, tending cattle for the absentee ranch owner, until the onset of another drought forces them to move on, homeless wanderers again. Yet, like the desert plants that defeat all rigors of wind and weather, the family maintains its will to survive in the harsh and solitary land. Intimately acquainted with the region of which he writes and keenly appreciative of the character of its inhabitants, into whose minds he has penetrated as few before him, Graciliano Ramos depicts them in a style whose austerity well becomes the spareness of the subject, creating a gallery of figures that rank as classic in contemporary Brazilian literature.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Graciliano Ramos is of the naturalistic tradition in the literature of Brazil, but this novel is not mere social protest. The author has a keen visual sense, and the reader becomes one with the part of the earth where Fabiano's life unfolds.... Barren Lives is a moving novel, one to ponder on. (Library Journal )

Product Details

• Paperback: 165 pages
• Publisher: University of Texas Press (1971)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0292701330
• ISBN-13: 978-0292701335
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.9 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #502,319 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Not very good translation..., October 21, 2011

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Sabinadm - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Barren Lives (Texas Pan American Series) (Paperback)

The book is a wonderful Brazilian masterpiece but I think the translation failed to express the poetry and "Brazility" in it. I hope there'll be more translations of this novel in English in the future...

15 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "Barren Lives" is the REAL LIFE we are all afraid of., June 24, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: Barren Lives (Texas Pan American Series) (Paperback)

I believe that "Barren Lives" could never be fully understood by any foreigner. I mean foreigner as someone who has not lived and grown up in Brazil. "Barren Lives" deals with the essence of human souls, when there is nothing left to believe in, nothing left to look foward to, nothing to relish, nothing to praise, when it all comes down not to being humans, as we're not, but to being animals. It sounds and looks very deep and poetic, but the strenght of this novel comes from its veracity. It is a a story that has happened to several families of people in Brasil. It doesn't make us, readers, wonder about our fragility or our values. It wants to sting us with the indignation of living our mediocre lives. It exposes human mediocrity. Far beyond social critic, it is a social attack. Ramos is dry: he saves up words, writing solely what's essential. He would condense it even more, to short sentences, litlle phrases, single words. He wouldn't even write, if he had the chance. A real genius of literature who has captured sentiments with completely detachment, subverting his own magistral reasoning. A book that MUST be read, although I couldn't trust an English version of it