"What brought us so far?"
Camilo Pessanha, "San Gabriel" in Clepsidra.
Macao, a place that is very much in the news in Portugal these days, as well as in the country's imagination, has existed since the day circumstances forced the Portuguese and the Chinese to communicate with each other. Let us recall the initial contact, or better yet, let us be guided by the 'story' (an ambiguous term) no one has been able to prove. There are various versions of it, one of which has become popular: between 1555 and 1557, 1after various vicissitudes at sea and along the south coast of China, the Portuguese, who had previously settled on the Liampó islands, asked the viceroy and the mandarins in Guangdong to allow them to settle on a small peninsula at the end of which was Xiangshan island. On that peninsula, there was a Buddhist temple (which still stands to this day) honouring Ama [A-Má], the Goddess of Seafarers. According to tradition, the Portuguese first landed by the temple (in a variant of this version, they landed occasionally, merely to dry themselves and their goods after storms).
When they arrived, the sailors found a small community of fishermen, whom they approached to enquire about the name of the place. That is when 'everything' began, when the story becomes ambiguous. It is easy to imagine what question the Portuguese asked and to accept that it was asked, but the answer they received has led to many theories; it is not clear that there was only one answer, and it is even less clear (and this is what is now of interest) that the answer was 'innocent'.
My intention here is not to retrace the history and problems surrounding the name 'Macao' (Interested readers may refer to the article by Graciete Batalha; ** rather, I want to corroborate the idea of an 'original' ambiguity, and present the hypothetical answer 'A-Má-Kao' and its two possible translations.
The first translation, which is generally accepted, is that the word means 'A-Má Bay'. This is the one that is popular among the Portuguese. When the Portuguese arrived in Macao, they found themselves in a fishing community, a place where they probably felt right 'at home', since 'everyone' there was in some way 'connected' to the sea, depended on it and had as a protector Someone they called 'Mother' (not the same one, obviously, but similar ones, at least in their 'role'). So they stayed.
Another translation, proposed by António Conceição Júnior and transmitted to him by a Chinese scholar, explains the meaning of the word as follows: "[...] when the Portuguese arrived, Macao consisted of one or two villages of fishermen and farmers [...]. The Portuguese must have landed with a Chinese or Malaysian pilot, and they must have wanted to know the name of the country. Either those people did not understand each other or the interpreters made a mistake because what is certain [...] is that the answer must have been more or less 'ntchi nei kóng Mât Kâu'." Conceição Júnior "[...] suddenly understood that etymological speleology sometimes depends more on what is on the surface than on in-depth phonetic developments... 'Mât Kâu',an excellent example of vernacular Guangdongnese, would have been immediately adapted and become Macao [...]."2 Taking this interpretation into consideration, the Portuguese may not have gotten a warm reception, but they were allowed to stay. Which they did. And Macao was, above all, a place of refuge.
There are 'connecting' elements in the two versions of this historical-mythological episode: the sea, the port and religiousness. When the Portuguese and the Chinese first met, they did not speak the same language, so language did not put distance between them; rather, through a process of transposition (the phonetic sequence took on a semantic value), it was (perhaps ironically) an element of contact. And from then on the previously unidentified land had a name (which later became "the Holy Name of God").
What is interesting to note (imagine) is the attitude of the two groups when they first met (an attitude that will be maintained, it seems, ad perpetum). The sailors who arrived, occasionally or otherwise, were open and wanted to get to know the people and the place. They did not "christen" the land. To do that would have indicated that they intended to possess or dominate it; when we give someone a name (especially without their consent) we, in a way, impose ourselves. In asking what the land was called, the Portuguese were letting the Chinese know that, rather than making themselves heard, they wanted to listen, to understand. The fishermen, for their part, were sure of their position and their place. They may not have been really friendly (bear in mind, for example, Pero Vaz de Caminha's Carta (Letter) and the arrival at Terras de Vera Cruz), but they were not openly hostile either. Even the "Mât Kâu" may simply signify a certain (and even apparent) arrogance in relation to the strangers who had arrived.
The two communities began, and continued, to live together. I use the expression 'living together' rather than 'collaborating' because they collaborated only for pragmatic reasons, mainly with respect to trade. They began sharing the same space, but only occasionally did they share the life of that space, and life in that space. Even power (political and otherwise) and its hierarchies were imposed in different ways on each of them. This means that neither community imposed itself on the other, which has obvious consequences: a superficial knowledge of each other and an apparent indifference for each other's ways, but also a mutual 'curiosity', more or less disguised or even hidden (each one tries, on the contrary, to present a self-sufficient and euphoric image of its history and culture), and a fatal attraction for the 'mystery' each feels in, and in relation to, the other. In short, relations between the two groups were characterized by pragmatic attitudes and attitudes of convenience, but they also gave rise to fascination and desire.
This 'story' of a meeting, contact and communication between the Portuguese and the Chinese in Macao is developed in literature (I use this verb --develop -- in the photographic sense, that is, as a process of making an image appear in the emulsion of the negative or the positive). And it is done in a privileged manner because literature is independent of the established and accepted means and ways. I do not intend to trace the history of literature, or to produce a complete list of the authors who were born, lived or passed through Macao and wrote about the city and its people, but I think it would be appropriate to mention some of the most interesting and/or important ones from the past and some of the most interesting or representative (in my opinion) from the present.
Camões immediately comes to mind, and another equivocal and mysterious 'story'. No one has documentation to prove that Camões lived and wrote in Macao. 3 What is true is that he has been venerated by both the Portuguese and the Chinese. There is a story about the viceroy of Guangdong, Ki Ying, visiting the grotto in the nineteenth century. He "[...] knelt down in front of the bust and paid homage to him in the Confucian tradition [and] he had a 'pailoi' gate built as a Chinese tribute [...]"4 This is a (unique) case of a true meeting between the two peoples, who join together to venerate the poet. Who knows, maybe we could have come to know each other well through poetry (could it be?). Obviously, it will never be through 'commercial pragmatism'. To speak of poetry or Camões is to speak of love. Could it be that the Chinese have not forgotten him because he 'loved' in Macao?
Another author, Fernão Mendes Pinto, a sailor, the personification of openness and respect for others whom, whenever it is justified, he praises and presents as models, apparently sought shelter in Macao after a troubled journey from Malacca. In his Peregrinação (Pilgrimage), he writes about the wealth and misery of the Portuguese in the Orient, their heroism or avarice, and their curiosity and admiration for other cultures, such as China's, which are so different from theirs.
In the eighteenth century, Manuel Maria Barbosa du Bocage lived in Macao. (According to Fr. Manuel Teixeira, it is presumed that he was in the city from September or October 1789 to March 1790.) He felt he was just passing through, could not adapt and longed to return to Portugal. He wrote a famous poem expressing his disenchantment and harshly criticizing the life of, and in, the city. 5 Bocage's association with the Orient is of interest because the author criticizes Portuguese decadence. Some people's attitudes served above all to divide and alienate. At the time, how could the Portuguese 'look' at others if they did not even attend to their own image?
Venceslau de Morais also passed through Macao on his way to Japan. 6 Two things resulted from his stay: a family and several texts, notably those included in Traços do Extremo Oriente (Sketches of the Far East) (1896), in which he gives his impressions of Macao and Chinese civilization. In a letter dating from 1892, he provides a synthesis of his life in Macao and his relations with the Chinese: "The neighbours across the way are Chinese, thank God. We are completely different, and we have different ways of looking at life because of our customs, habits, language, feelings, beliefs. What the European neighbour, the 'fan-quai', the foreign devil, does at home must not concern them much. When I am bored -- I confess it here just between us -- I amuse myself by intruding on the intimate existence of these good Chinese people. My selfishness is condemnable, and it pains me to say so."7 In a word, the contact between Morais and the Chinese was practically inexistent, superficial. He never entered the house across the way, but limited himself to observing his neighbours, noting their exterior, although he feels he is "[...] intruding on their intimate existence." The attitude of the Chinese is similar, or rather, they are even more indifferent -- the 'foreign devil' does not interest them at all.
Macao and its inhabitants may have initially been an object of curiosity and fascination, but those feelings quickly changed: "[...] all this is so strange that there are no words in our western language to define it."8 This led to longing, the pain of exile, the desire to leave: "What I lack in this improvised home, where I thought I would lack nothing? I make every effort to decipher this enigma. At first, this feeling of anguish is so vague that it perplexes me, almost making me doubt my own talent. Little by little, a pain that invades my soul takes shape, radiating from I know not where, eating away at I know not what fibres. And this pain rudely awakens me, bringing me back to reality, awakens in me the inner voice that exists in all of us, that speaks to us in the isolation. [...] I finally understand myself, [...] I lack something, [...] the joyful and healthy breath of life that gives man self-esteem, love for others, a path, a destination, in the journey of existence."9 For this man, Macao was a place of self-discovery, self-interpretation, a 'port' in which to prepare his journey of full discovery, the one that took him to Japan and led him to himself.
In 1894, Camilo Pessanha arrived in Macao. Always affirming his status as a Portuguese poet, he let himself be seduced by China and tried to get to know it as well as possible. He learned the language, studied Chinese literature and art, and. assumed typical 'postures' of that civilization. At first sight, it is not in Clepsidra (Clepsydra) that this fascination is felt. I say at first sight because, in fact, his knowledge of the Chinese language and literature likely influenced some of his poetry. Just as his translation of the Oito Elegias Chinesas (Eight Chinese Elegies) likely reflected the subtlety of form and content that are characteristic of symbolism and his personal vision of poetry. It is in China that he explicitly discusses Chinese aesthetics, literature and social life. As António Quadros puts it: "[...] the extraordinary and very beautiful essays he wrote on Chinese art and poetry reveal the fondness of this symbolist, musical and concise Portuguese poet for the culture that best preserved the reminiscences of what is most subtle, symbolic, graphic and poetic."10 Pessanha rises up against the shameful behaviour he observes among wealthy and powerful Chinese, and exalts the virtues of the people: "[...] these sober, thrifty, suffering and pacific people, who respect laws, obey authority, persevere in their projects and work untiringly, overcoming the most discouraging difficulties through patience, tenacity and effort."11 In China, he also offers his opinion on Chinese art, observing that to the Chinese, art is more a collective manifestation governed by pre-established rules than the manifestation of individual "originality".12 "All poets [...] are absent beings and, even if they were not, if for no other reason, exiles. They are exiled from themselves like Pessanha, born east of his own West, and always distant from himself."13 These words by Carlos Cunha paint a vivid "portrait" of who the poet is and how he thinks. The only refuge Pessanha had was the language in which he wrote, one he knew how to use like no one else, enriching it with the subtlety of music. And this may be how he became (or got us) closer to the Chinese, who apparently were so distant. Because in Chinese -- "[...] the most beautiful and suggestive of all languages, living or dead", to use Pessanha's words -- the senses of sight and hearing also exchange views, perhaps like in no other language. Shaped in large part by the evocative visual power of its characters (which, through an extremely long process of abstraction, maintains the 'idea that gives birth to form'), it possesses the secret of translating into sound the visual flagrancy of the kind of graphic insight that the ideogram represents. So it is not surprising that poetry records what the eyes, enchanted, listen to."14 In reality, we know that Pessanha turned an analytical language such as Portuguese into "[...] a synthetical instrument [...]," whose logic, sonority and rhythm he (re)composed.
Although Pessanha was far from the homeland, he felt tied to it through Macao. In "...] Macao, one's imagination is easily exalted by nostalgia. In some secluded spot in a pine forest less frequented by the Chinese, it is easy to get away from the Chinese buildings, the Chinese pagodas, the Chinese graves, the mysterious Chinese inscriptions found at every corner on rectangles of red paper, the yellow waters of the river [...] and to create, at certain times of the year and certain hours of the day, the illusion of a Portuguese land. The person writing these lines has at various times, while walking down the path of solitude, had the distinct impression (although one only slightly less fleeting than lightning) of walking along a certain hill in Beira-Alta that he knew quite well in his adolescence."15 To poets, this 'transfer' is essential to writing and to life because it makes it possible "[...] to a certain extent [to have] the illusion of being in Portugal, which the Portuguese need in order to exercise their special imaginative activity [...]."16 It is interesting to note that when Pessanha is in Portugal, he feels nostalgic about Macao. This is the cause of his essential 'division' and the desire to live 'between', in a space that is neither a place of separation nor the imposed route from one to the other. "Do you know what I would like now? Never to arrive at my destination [...]. To sail on a ship without a destination."17 That way he might be able to escape his fate as an absent being and find the Land of Encounter, where the 'sorrow of all exiles' would disappear once and for all.
The year Camilo Pessanha arrived in Macao, Bernardo Pinheiro Correia de Melo, the count of Arnoso, published Jornadas pelo Mundo (Journeys Across the World). It is well known that this author was linked to the "Geração dos Vencidos da Vida" ("The Generation Defeated by Life"), having been a close friend of Eça de Queirós. He entered the military and went on a diplomatic mission to Beijing. The work mentioned above, in which he describes in detail what he observed in China and Japan, resulted from this mission. Macao is the subject of a few pages in that book, to which I will refer very briefly. The Count of Arnoso spent only five days in Macao, during which time he obviously acquired only a superficial knowledge of the land and the people. In his book, he describes the landscape, lists buildings and institutions, mentions social customs and makes references to history. In short, it can be said that the text is of interest because he mentions that at the time there were two 'worlds' in Macao, and they only occasionally came into contact with each other: "[...] only one part of the city of Macao is occupied by Europeans [...]."18 He pays particular attention to the other part of the city -- "the bazaar" -- where the Chinese live and work, describing its houses, shops, temples, institutions, festivities, customs (namely gambling) and economy.
A few years later, between 1941 and 1944, Ferreira de Castro wrote A Volta ao Mundo (Around the World), a set of texts/newspaper columns also in the category of 'travel literature', reminiscent of Pierre Loti, with particular emphasis on the exoticism of the Orient. In it there are a few pages on Macao. They are presented like a newspaper report, 19 so they transmit a vision that, if not completely superficial, at least appears to be the result of "[...] scratching the surface [...]." That is all that could be expected from a two-week stay.
Like the Count of Arnoso, Ferreira de Castro refers to history, or rather to the mythical history of Macao, especially to that of the two origins. He says that the Portuguese were considered pirates four hundred years ago, settled among pirates and fought against them, receiving Macao as a gift from the emperor to thank them for the assistance they provided against 'other' pirates who terrorized the seas off the coast of South China. Describing the landscape he observes from his ship as it approaches the coast, what enchants the author at first is the fact that Macao looks like a Portuguese land: "One would say that the Portuguese managed to modify the very landscape of Asia, even its trees, giving them the appearance of northern Portugal."20 The he becomes fascinated by a particular characteristic of Macao: "No passport is required at the port of Macao, nor is luggage checked [...]. No one wants to know who we are. In these times of mistrust, when we have become slaves to identity papers, stamps and visas, Macao's indifference to people's character may be its main virtue [...]."21
In the streets, he is enchanted by the "[...] mixture of words and alphabetical signs [...]"22 on shop signs, although he observes that the Chinese have no knowledge of the language of Camões. He finds the Macanese nights and the Chinese junks "[...] pregnant with beauty and mystery [...],"23 concluding that "without them, without their lines of long ago and the suggestion of an exotic life, the Sea of China would lose much of its charm."24 He leisurely describes what he sees. Like Ferreira de Castro, he observes that "[...] although it is small, the Macao peninsula consists of two completely different cities: the Portuguese one and the native one."25 When he reaches the Avenida Almeida Ribeiro, he notices that it "[...] reveals two different old civilizations that never merged, although they have lived together for a long time. The first section is occupied by houses and European-style businesses, and ends at Largo do Leal Senado [which] is like a border. Beyond it, the Avenida Almeida Ribeiro loses its European appearance and becomes Chinese."26 As he enters the Chinese quarter, attracted by the exoticism to which he refers several times, he notes and records the customs associated with the economy of Macao, its religion and culture, and the life of the Chinese in general. And he is astonished because "[...] the Portuguese, who like to impose their ways wherever they go, made an exception to the rule here -- and respected the aesthetics and habits of the Chinese."27 There may be a reason. According to Ferreira de Castro, "[...] the Chinese people, who are extremely intelligent, have, in general, noble human qualities. They know, as few people do, how to be neighbours and live in a community."28 He also goes to all the places where the presence of the Portuguese is evident: Colina da Guia (Guia Hill) ("[...] where the lighthouse keeper cultivates a grapevine from Portugal, in a constant battle with the climate, to ease his homesickness [...]"); Colina do Monte (lit.: Monte Hill); Colina de Camões (Camões Hill) (where the famous grotto left him desolate, "The only ugly thing is the grotto where the epic writer supposedly wrote part of Os Lusíadas (The Lusiads) [...]"); 29 churches and chapels, notably the ruins of São Paulo (St. Paul's [Church]). Along the way, he sees temples, restaurants and streets that are typically Chinese. He comments on what he sees and expresses his fondness for China's ancient culture. Finally, he finds himself "[...] at the Chinese border [...]," through which he must pass to enter the vast Middle Empire.
António Sérgio arrived in Macao in the second half of January 1905 and stayed until November of the same year. In letters to his family that are some-what of an autobiography, he gives his impressions of the territory and describes a few episodes from his stay. The letters are of interest mainly because they show the daily life of a major Portuguese cultural figure while he was in Macao. They reveal someone who felt "[...] temporarily in [...]" for he remained tied to Portugal (and to his father) by a correspondence that seemed to interest him above all else and served to maintain his dialogue with the country (and his father). He travelled to Macao by ship, but he returns (metonymically) to Portugal through his writing.
There is not much of a connection between him and Macao; there is no intimacy between them. We get the impression that even his social relations in Macao are dictated by his family's influence -- the people he visits, for example, are or were his father's or grandfather's friends.
The language barrier seems impenetrable to him, although it does not bother him because it is not essential to him. The communication problems are viewed with a certain fair play and give rise to observations that, if not ironic, are at least goodhumoured: "Day 23. After lunch at the Macao-Hotel, visiting. First, the governor, who invited me to dinner. Since I could not understand the coolie, an interpreter explained to me where I was to be taken next. However, the way the orders were understood, I ended up in houses of people I did not know."30
Events related to the Chinese community, such as Chinese New Year, go unnoticed. And even an incident of general interest, the threat of an earth-quake and people's reactions to it, he knows of only indirectly: "This is what they say is happening, because I only speak to my friends."31 The only thing that awakens his interest is [...] a "[...] duck farm [...]." Lets us look at what important things he has to say about the 31 st of August: "My life has not changed. During the day, I remain on board, then around 4:30 pm I go to Areia Preta (Black Sand [beach]), to a duck farm. There are many ducks, of two sizes: some are very tiny, with yellow feathers, and the others are bigger, but they have neither feathers nor wings. These go to a large tank, where they are fed. The others remain in enclosures with low fencing; the more agile ones jump onto the tubs, while the others splash around in the water that spills out. When the sun is low, the chirping starts to diminish; they pile on top of each other, very close together, their eyes closed; some of the ones that are on top of the pile and want to warm up in the middle begin to push the ones that are already settled and there is a small scuffle. Eventually, they all lie down, calm down, and once in a while one awakens with a start because his neighbour hurts him [...]. This is beautiful, the only beautiful thing I see here."32
Could it be that the author was interested in how the Chinese raised ducks, since there were no aviaries in the West? Or less prosaically, could this in a sense be another version of the story of the "ugly duckling" who envies the fate of all the others, who are all the same, all together, in a warm nest, while he feels different, wretched, alone. Sérgio is the one who says: "It worries me to spend my days in such useless pursuits. I try not to think about it. That way I manage to remain in peace, unpreoccupied and, from what people tell me, fatter [...]."33
Not even Oriental art gives him any pleasure; "[...] I do not like the Chinese style or the Japanese."34 In a letter dated the 4th of November, he reflects on Chinese aesthetics, making an implicit comparison with that of Europe: "When it comes to European art, I do not know other people's tastes, but at least I have mine. With respect to Chinese art, I have no criteria: nothing interests me, and I do not understand anything. I find everything banal and insipid; always the same thing, devoid of meaning and interest. Always the same themes, the same processes, the same routine and stupid taste. Patience? Work? Yes. But art, beauty, taste? No. Not at all, absolutely not. Anyone who saw a Chinese tapestry, table or plate a thousand years ago saw all tapestries, tables and plates by all artisans and from all periods, in omnia secula secolorum."35
There are some common elements in the experiences and vision of the three authors I just mentioned, as far as Macao is concerned. What immediately stands out is the brevity of their stay -- five days, two weeks, eleven months -- which leads to a superficial knowledge, or even to a lack of knowledge, of the place, its people and its specific culture (and people who have lived in Macao know that it takes "time" to understand and come to love this "space"). This lack of knowledge leads to two attitudes, only apparently different: either rejection or an attraction for a (pseudo-)exoticism that is a false attraction or, more so, a false bond.
What everyone immediately notices about Macao is the topography of the city. It is divided in two, which lets the modus vivendi of its population show through. This division does not signify any type of opposition. It is a way of using space that reveals how the two communities live together: people mind their own business; the Portuguese do not impose themselves and the Chinese are good neighbours (cold perhaps, but pacific). In short, there is no fusion, but neither is there confusion. What exists is a sort of soft apartheid that none of the authors questions. And it seems that the way the two communities initially met is repeating itself, continuing.
Is Pessanha's example unique and unrepeatable? No. Others have spoken of a deeper knowledge and stronger ties (or the desire for such), as is apparent in their texts. I will mention some of them and some of their works (which may not always be of great literary interest but are no doubt of interest from an anthropological and historical point of view): Maria Ana Acciaioli Tamagnini, Lin Tchi Fá: Flor de Lotus (Lin Tchi Fd: Lotus Flower) (1925); Emilio San Bruno, O Caso da Rua Volong (The Volong Street Affair) and Cenas da Vida Colonial (Scenes of Colonial Life) (1928); Manuel da Silva Mendes, Excertos da Filosofia Daoist (Excerpts of Daist Philosophy) ( 1931); Jaime Correia do Inso, O Caminho do Oriente (The Way to the Orient) (1931), Visões da China (Visions of China) (1932), China (1935), Cenas da Vida de Macao (Scenes of Living in Macao) (1941); Alvaro de Melo Machado, Coisas de Macao (Macanese Things) (1913); António de Santa Clara, Cartas do Extremo Oriente (Letters from the Far East) (1938); Francisco de Carvalho e Rêgo, O Caso do Tesouro do Templo de A-Má (The Affair of Ama Temple's Treasury) (1949), Cartas da China (Letters from China) (1949), Macao (1950), Lendas e Contos da Velha China (Legends and Tales from Old China) (1950), Mui-Fá: Flor da Ameixeira (Mui-Fá: Plum Blossom) (1951); Joaquim Paço de Arcos, O Navio dos Mortos (The Ship of the Dead) (1952), Circulação das Memórias (The Circulation of Memories) [d. n. n.]; Danilo Barreiros, A Paixão Chinesa de Venceslau de Morais (The Chinese Passion of Venceslau de Morais) (1955), O Testamento de Camilo Pessanha (The Will of Camilo Pessanha) (1961); Ernesto Leal, O Homem que Comia Névoa (The Man Who Ate Mist) (1964); José Joaquim Monteiro, Minha Viagem para Macao (My Travel to Macao) (1939); Benjamim Videira Pires, O Espelho do Mar (The Mirror of the Sea) (1986); Jorge Listopad, Novos Territórios (New Territories) (1986); Graciete Batalha, Bom Dia, S'tôra (Good Morning M'Lady) [d. n. n.]; Alberto Estima de Oliveira, O Diálogo do Silêncio (The Dialogue of Silence (1988); Altino de Tojal, Histórias de Macao (Stories from Macao) (1987); José Vale de Figueiredo, O Provedor dos Vivos (The Purveyor of the Living) (1988); Maria do Rosário Almeida, Chü Kong (1987); Jorge Arrimar, Fonte do Lilau (The Lilau Fountain) (1990), Secretos Sinais (Secret Signs) (1992); António Rebordão Navarro, As Portas do Cerco (The Border Gate) (1992); João de Aguiar, O Comedor de Pérolas (The Pearl Eater) (1992).
This list does not include any writers from Macao. I would like to say a few words about them now. They are a group of writers who consider themselves a result of Luso-Oriental contact and present themselves as children of a community that, today, has problems of identity. As António Conceição Júnior writes: "Once the entrepôt was established, the first buildings built, the first Indians and Malaysians brought over (who were joined, little by the Chinese), a new species was born, one of those that emerge spontaneously, the result of circumstances: the 'Macanese', an ample genetic mixture resulting from all these people the Portuguese met along the way, and whom the Church, through the Dominicans, the Franciscans and the Jesuits convinced to take refuge in Christianity [...] for centuries, it was the Macanese, the product of the land called Macao, who preserved, adapted and usufructed everything Portuguese that remained in Macao -- and there was a lot."36
What the author means by "everything" is a specific and original culture that also shows through in a literature that is strictly Macanese. Luís Gonzaga Gomes, Contos Chineses (Chinese Tales) (1950), Lendas Chinesas de Macao (Chinese Legends from Macao) ( 1951 ), Chinesices (Things Chinese) (1952), among others; Deolinda da Conceição, Cheong-Sam, A Cabaia (Cheong-Sam, the Cheong-sam) (1956); Leonel Alves, Por Caminhos Solitários (Through Solitary Paths) (1983); and Henrique de Senna Fernandes, Nam-Van (1978) and Amor e Dedinhos de Pé (Love and Little Toes) (1986) are a group of authors I will call "veterans" of Macanese literature. There are other, younger ones, who will no doubt also be in the limelight in the future.
All one has to do is look at the titles mentioned above to see how Macanese literature is made: the language is Portuguese, but the themes are Chinese or Luso-Chinese. This bicultural writing results from openness to others and reveals a refusal to be indifferent, rather than the desire to assimilate or be assimilated. It speaks of the 'good neighbour' that may (why not?) become a loved one or a lover. It speaks of this desire, so it is transgressive in many aspects. To prove what I am saying, I will cite as examples some texts included in the works I mentioned: A Chan, a Tancareira (Achan, the Tanca Woman), the short story by Senna Fernandes; the poems by Leonel Alves in which he joyfully affirms his Luso-Chinese origins; Deolinda da Conceição's stories, O Calvário de Lin Fong (Ling Fong's Cal-vary) or O Refúgio da Saudade (The Shelter of Nostalgia).
At a certain point in the history of literature in Macao, the 'marriage' took place, from which emerged a common language-- the patois -- and texts in this language. Today, the patois is hardly ever used ("[...] although [...] a new genesis of a new way of speaking is already manifesting itself [...],"37 ) perhaps because, having initially been the language of contact between the two communities -- the Portuguese and the Chinese -- it may have developed into the language of a group that, at a certain point, 'closed' itself off too much. 38 For that reason, poetry written in the patois, in the words of Graciete Batalha, "[...] always had western roots and has nothing to do with Chinese poetry."39 The last author to use the patois was José dos Santos Ferreira.
The list I presented above does not include the names of António Manuel Couto Viana, Eugénio de Andrade, José Augusto Seabra, Miguel Torga, Agustina Bessa-Luís, Natália Correia and Maria Ondina Braga. These writers all passed through Macao and shared their impressions in texts that are related to the territory, in one way or another. Their experiences are very different from those of Ferreira de Castro, António Sérgio or the count of Arnoso, for they all discuss relations between Portugal and Macao as the moment of 'official separation' approaches, and they do it by speaking of their personal and unique way of viewing the facts and the place.
In Até ao Longíquo China Navegou (To the Remote China He Travelled) (1991) and No Oriente do Oriente (In the Orient of the Orient) (1987), Couto Viana speaks of his settlement in, and travels through, the Orient and especially Macao. There, his writing is influenced by that of Bocage, Patrício, Pessanha, Mendes Pinto and Camões, for he is 'tied' to these poets and like them 'tied' to the "Orient of the Orient" -- Macao. His poetic itinerary follows the same paths -- it starts with reality, 'undoes it' and creates one that is more 'real'. Along the way, there is nostalgia for a time that was and a time that might be. Hence there is the paradoxical 'empty-full' experience that is the stuff of dreams. To this poet, Macao is the last dream place -- a space where one lives by 'exchanging' and not by trading or imposition -- teachings, feelings, lan-guages, cultures and histories are all exchanged. For this reason, Couto Viana's poetry reveals an attentive and delicate observer of a delicate and fragile reality that seduced and enchanted him, and with which he fell in love. It is with, and because of, his way of seeing things that, rather than seeing what is exotic, he sees what is identical in that which is distinctive, what is the same in that which is different, and shows the desire to adapt and communicate (which, as you may recall, takes us back to the initial situation).
The result is a 'mixed' writing in which the poet's feelings are confronted with elements that are apparently external to him - nature, customs, people who are the 'normal ones' there, where they meet. It is in this common life that he wants to participate and make us participate - a desire for a union, as such, 'until death do us part'. And, for this reason, there is a passive non-acceptance of a 'separation' that feels imposed. As Joaquim Manuel Magalhães writes: "Woven through these poems is the trauma of the absolute end of a Portugal that is more vast than that of the European borders in which Couto Viana believed and for which he fought, feeling that he had lost the battle [...]", which leads to a "pathos" that this critic points out: "This is what happens in climactic moments in relationships that make good poems about a bond between two people, which is always a dying relationship. And there is all the more pathos when the subject is the relationship between two cultures (although it may be felt by an individual only)."40 But as João Bigotte Chorão writes, in reference to Até ao Longíquo China Navegou'. "[...] something survives storms, history, people, time and pain: poetry, which is more than the rhetorical celebration it has long been considered to be; it is the inexhaustible spring where, as we cross the desert, we quench our thirst for hope for the future."41
At the end of his (our) Breve Roteiro Lírico de Macao (Brief Lyrical Guide to Macao), Couto Viana looks at the port where: "The light shines from high above, lighting the way for ships, in the obscurity of a presage, dissipating the fear of rocks, showing the way to a future filled with calm seas and victory [...]"42 - the lighthouse, the poem.
Perhaps it was "[...] in the wake of another Orient [...] an Orient east of the Orient [...]" that José Augusto Seabra was in Macao. In the dedication and the epigraph, as well as in the title of Couto Viana's work, there is the presence of the other person - the poet - a person who, never having been to Macao, one day wrote under the pseudonym Álvaro de Campos, "Macao at one o'clock at night [- a time when] it is possible to navigate [...]" and the ships traverse time and the sea, all of time and all seas.) Seabra wrote Poemas do Nome de Deus (Poems of Name of God) - poems presented in a bilingual volume so that they seem to have been written by four people or recited by two voices. "It is a book about love [...]"43 in which the 'unsayable' is said, under the protection of the 'seas' of Camilo Pessanha, who to Augusto Seabra is "[...] the emblematic figure of Portugal's presence in Macao and the Orient [because] more than any other modern Portuguese writer, he embodies our national condition of 'rootedness' and 'wandering' [and] 'in space' he is a poet who links the West to the East [and] 'in time' a poet who links the past to the future."44
The poems are about "the name" - and the name encompasses the memory of "the canto", "the epic", "the bard", "the grotto", "the language", "the writing", and "the symbol"; about "exile", which consists of "loyalty", "the rose", "the ogive", and "the Holy Spirit"; about "the ruins", "the gods", "the dead" and "the ashes"; about experiencing "the undefined", "blue", "the seven moons", "opium", "gambling" and "time"; and the sign slides through and from "the rhythm", "the music", "the garden" and "the islands", and breaks through the barrier "of the wall" and "the siege" to speak once again, "of the mariners" "the route" and "the prophecy", when "the dragon" awakens.
In Poemas do Nome de Deus, Macao is the other name of the epic, or a "[...] remnant of an epic [...]," which is why the "bard" is present and one talks about the mythical grotto where "Pilgrims of the divided shadows / drawing dreams on the painful, / wounded rocks of memory that / we cover with balsam, hide / from the morning light? We leave / the fragrance of the already drooping boughs / in strands of ash on the road / more secret, within the return."45 And the language and the city speak to us of the presence of history and of the moment when the homeland and the "[..] Holy Name of God [...]" were "sheltered" there. It tells us of its vocation to "relink" different peoples and different gods in religion - that"[...] of the Holy Spirit [...]," of love. Could it be that from the ruins and the ashes it will rise up, with the help of opium or gambling, for another time, an undefined blue that we lacked long ago? When the dragon awakens and we have to return, will we be "[...] the lost mariners, / going around the margins of vagueness three times, / imagining."?46 Or will we still have "[...] the glory of knowing / the itinerary of the trip?"47 And because "[...] / everything is uncertain and last. / Everything is scattered, nothing is whole",48 "[...] from the prophecy [...]" (by António Patrício)49 we are left with another, final question: "When we only go / sails raised / and diluted / with neither mast nor burning flame, / what anchor will / still announce, / in forgetfulness / another Orient?"50
In October 1990, Eugénio de Andrade made a pilgrimage to Macao. The month before, the evidence that the meeting had already taken place became public in the form of a bilingual anthology (Portuguese-Chinese), Com Palavras Amo (I Love with Words). The texts were translated into Chinese by the poet Yao Jingming, who says of the Portuguese poet: "Eugénio de Andrade comes to us from a distant land. He comes with the grace of fountains, the acridness of lime and the other name of the land. He comes, because he never left. [...] He is a poet with roots in Portugal, but his universe is also ours because from it he makes us see and feel from the soul, absorbing the being in enlightened revelations and in eternal reconciliation. Now that he has come to us and we look at him, he has already built us a house in transparency."51 Finally the full meeting, in the common house? Could it be that it is only when they must part that "lovers" discover how much they complete each other and belong to each other? That for the first time our eyes light up and reveal "[...] the plenitude of the sun, the murmur of the water, the rhythm of the seasons, the appeal of fruits, the smile that opened the door."52 The poet, poets (the Portuguese and the Chinese) will make "[...] the days and nights more liveable."53
The twelve poems Eugénio de Andrade wrote in Macao are included in Notas sobre o Oriente (Notes from the East), a journal of his travels through the area. Each poem is a fundamental text to provide proof of the meeting I referred to. The first moment of that meeting is reflected in Camilo Pessanha, o Mestre (Camilo Pessanha, the Teacher), the master of language: "[...] the greatest seduction of that 'alchemist' was in his fine capacity to suggest, insinuate and not conclude what he had begun saying, as if saying was not what mattered most to Pessanha. This was indecision turned into the material of poetry, creating with this reluctance to speak a plot; a subtle complicity with silence, a hesitation between thinking and feeling."54 Pessanha was also the master of life: "And there was also that life, his life (or rather non-life) standing well apart from that impenitent, dictatorial, opinionated national flood of words, with the poet only dedicated in criticism of eternity that was his route to silence [...]"55 The second moment, recorded in Ofício de Paciência (Labour of Patience), is when he sees the city for the first time, its character, its people and the Portuguese names of the streets; hears the conversation of the elderly Chinese and the music of a Chinese girl playing the flute; and comes to understand the patience that characterizes the daily life of the Chinese in Macao.
He subsequently goes to the Jardim de Lou Lim leoc (Lou Lim leoc Garden) and emerges from there with a stalk of bamboo and Eastern wisdom. Then he contemplates As Pedras (The Stones) that "[...] defy time and its dust, [...]"56 especially that Pedra Profunda (Profound Stone) that emerges from the air, a stone from God or His disciple (Paul, not Peter), to whom the poet reaffirms his fidelity and says: "[I] came from far to touch the fire of its geometry without bounds."57 The sixth poem, written during an ordinary day, is about seeing the Montanhas Verdes (Green Mountains) of China, Li Bai's China - the re-encounter. And Eugénio de Andrade is Fernão Mendes Pinto, but in another century, or a mandarin, on the terrace of the Mandarin Oriental, and the poetry flows "[...] as if poetry were no more than an inevitable, long farewell."58 This is because when poets write poetry, they speak of separation. A great love always involves farewells and distance, so those who love "[...] se vão da lei da Morte libertando [...]" ("[...] liberate themselves from the law of Death [...]).59
We remain in the blue-green of the bamboos that reach for the sky, with a different wisdom, found this time in the Templo da Barra (Ama Temple). There is also the enigma of rituals such as the "walking" of birds in the gardens of Macao by elderly people whose "[...] frank and open smile [is] the most closely guarded secret of the Orient."60 Before the end, there is the synthesis: "On the pan of the scale one verse is enough / to weigh my life on the other."61 These are everyone's words, religious words. The others, the mediocre ones among those he sees carved on the grotto must be removed because they offend poets. Others must be rewritten, so that they may be "[...] entwined with love, war and dreams [...]" (in the words of Drumond de Andrade) to speak of Macao and its greatest poet.
Light and water mark the approach to Coloane - an island - a port that in the past harboured pirates and today is blue, shady and misty. The journey ends at the cemetery, which in this case is not a place of pain but a place of beauty and another encounter: "A woman who was sweeping the graves picked up a vase, filled it with water and handed it to me with a smile. That was the prettiest thing in the cemetery, that smile, cool even in the mid-day sun."62
The circle is closed. The teacher of the first moment continues to keep the poet company, and will do so forever. In the end, Macao will continue to be like a house whose doors will always be open to poetry, which is alive and well there.
With the same sense of adventure as the first to leave and with the feeling of someone who accepts a challenge, without fully understanding it or what it will lead to, Miguel Torga decided to travel from Coimbra to Macao on the 2nd of June 1987. Being Portuguese and a poet, he could not have adopted any other attitude: "Far East of restlessness, /I am going there! /I know not why / but when I get there /I will find out what took me, / There, where so many who preceded me, / got lost, / And in being lost, they learned, / that the only true Portuguese people/ are the ones who, one day, deny human smallness, / and invent themselves and search for themselves / in the mists of the wide-open sea and madness."63 Like many other Portuguese people, the author had already been to China, in his imagination. Of all of them, the paradigm is O Senhor Ventura (Mr. Fortune), the adventurer who, once in Macao, was faced with himself, the established laws and the place, then left for other destinations he imagined existed and for which his sense of freedom hungered.
This time, the trip is real, and Torga's reason for going is to participate in Macao's annual tribute to Camões, on the 10th of June (since to speak of Camões is to speak of the homeland, the underlying reason becomes clearer): "I am going to Macao to speak about Camões, / in his name, and for them, / the builders of an empire of illusions, /I am going, as a new messenger, / To guarantee to the future that Portugal / Will always be as universal / As the infinite restlessness of each of its children."64
Torga arrived in Macao on the 6th of June, and on the days that followed (7th and 8th) the contact he records in his Diário (Diary) takes place. The experience leads him to conclude: "Everything in this land is at once natural and magical, concrete and abstract, immobile and fleeting. [...] Even the air one breathes has a perturbing quality and is like an opiate. Rather than being stimulating, it makes you languid. A tangible mirage, a challenge to our reason, our sensibility and our common sense. Macao is not a reality that can be clearly grasped. It is like a confused dream of Portugal."65
On the 10th of June, in a 'Last Supper' ritual at the dinner table (typically a Chinese meal), the communion is established: "For the first time in my life I was seated at a table ingesting each dish as if I were swallowing a host, taking communion, and I liked that."66 The 'Passion' unfolds without all the steps being nationally understood: "I do what I can to understand this land, but I cannot. Everything is so enigmatic, so changeable, so ambiguous, so labyrinthine, that we lose our senses with every step."67 The surprise of the first arrivals in Macao is repeated. [...] The surprise and the desire to understand. The simultaneous discovery of oneself and others, and the realization that: "In the midst of the yellow uniformity, it is we who are exotic."68 Then the fatal question must be asked: "We have been here for four hundred years. Doing what?"69 The answer is given by the presence (whether it is historically proven or not matters little) of Camões. On the day of the celebration, it is established: "[...] Camões was here and is from here, because the spirit of an entire people arrived here, a people who, like no other, unites in life and work, to justify our impulse to wander, curiosity, daring, tenacity, wisdom and ambitions".70
As the passion comes to an end and the final 'Station' [of the Calvary] draws near, Torga, speaking in the plural (like Camões, he is all of us), drafts Portugal's will: "At this moment, we ourselves are here saying goodbye to the last redoubt of this past expansion. This visit of love is a farewell."71 But it is not the end of everything. The spirit will endure: "After we leave, we will continue to be here, present in each family tree, in each surname, in each custom, in each term, in each seasoning, in each prayer, in each moment, in each ruin."72 It cannot have been with impunity that we came from so far and tried for so long to 'be' in common. The "[...] future will not be one of occupation but one of communion", 73 and for this reason "[...] we are sure to return. To return eternally."74 The Guia lighthouse will be there to guide us, and the ruins of a church will be there to welcome us.
At the moment of the critical separation, Torga criticizes the political logic, suggesting that it would be to China's (and the world's) advantage if 'things' were not as the 'powers' have planned: "It is a pity that national pride measures all foreign shadows by the same standard. Whereas Hong Kong is an example of capitalist insolence, a colonial affront that offends heaven and earth, Macao is merely a discrete adventurous landmark. And perhaps it would not hurt the Chinese colossus to consent to having a Portuguese presence, anchored at its side, continue to give it lyrical news from the West."75 Eternal obstinacy or nascent longing? As someone once said, Torga was a "[...] shaman-poet whose verses gave voice to the nation's soul"76 because his voice reveals the essence of Portugal. So it is natural that Portugal allowed him to speak on its behalf, and sent him with a message of farewell and a promise of eternal return. It was this sacramental 'gesture' that the poet made the day he spoke about the other poet in Macao (in his (our) heart the words of Jesus: "Father, if possible, take this cup away from me.")
Portuguese women have also written about their 'special' ties to Macao. Agustina Bessa Luís and Natália Correia walked through the city, felt its mystery and magic, and wrote about their experiences (although briefly). In A Pedra Decorada (The Decorated Stone), 77 Agustina Bessa Luis, in her unique style of fable-reflection, traces the 'history' of the territory to raise the following doubt: "[...] Macao grew out of a gentlemen's agreement."78 Once more, there is the insinuation of a 'stubbornness' that made us stay four hundred years, despite the difficulties. It will not be easy to separate two peoples who, despite their many differences, also have much in common. The idea of "time", for example, and how it is viewed is the same in the two communities. From that stems the 'essential' mutual understanding: "Like the Chinese, the Portuguese have a particular tendency to waste time, to enjoy it without the avidity the English [and the Americans] have. Time, for the Chinese, is not money, but rather a wonderful spiritual activity, an item to barter against eternity, not for survival. The Portuguese are also artists in this respect. Time is merely an indiscretion committed by God. The concept of time is given to us so that we may place ourselves in relation to any action repeated over the millennia with the same degree of wisdom and inexplicable importance. [...] Not everybody took the trouble to understand the character of the Chinese, but the Portuguese had an impression that there was a link which could be observed between men, an element of waiting which proved to be the greatest uniter of people."79 And family ties cannot be loosened this way, by decree, on an set date.
Like Torga, Bessa LUIS notes the radical difference between Macao and Hong Kong and suggests that the final outcome will only unjustly be the same. Referring to the space, the people, the birds, she says: "[...] Macao is also a land of poetry." And with respect to Chinese women: "[...] not even the twenty decorated stones can give a real idea of the women in Macao. The oriental woman is a world apart [...]"80 - because of her joy, her strength, her freedom, her curiosity, which have been hindered for so long. In a letter to Fr. Manuel Teixeira dated January 14, 1990, she suggests that she may return because she feels that it is necessary, that "it is right not to let [...] such memories fade. If they are not written down, no monument will save them."
Literature will be the witness of days gone by and the building of a future. It will be consubstantial architecture that everyone looks at, a universal city, to say of this other one that, being "[...] the door to the bay [it is and always will be] a port of departure and a port of arrival."81
In Versos de Brisa Portuguesa Escritos numa Flor de Lótus (Verses of Portuguese Breeze Written on a Lotus Flower), Natália Correia talks about another writer who lived and worked in Macao - Maria Ana de Magalhães Tamagnini Barbosa82 - considering her a "[...] rare star of the constellation of our orientalist lyricism."83 In her she sees the consummation of the union of the "[...] feminine stirring of the Portuguese soul and the Orient that holds the deep secret of the mystery of the heavens in the world."84 To Natália Correia, women have a natural tendency to understand the specificity of the Orient. As she rereads Barbosa's work, she observes that "[...] the author of Flor de Lótus [...] gives wings to her feminine nature, which is attracted by the yin, and for this reason she adheres to the mythology of a civilization that is guided by the moon."85
I think Natália Correia's text is of particular interest because it reaffirms women's capacity to live the relationship between Portugal and Macao, that is, the bond between the Portuguese and the Chinese in this meeting place. No one has done, or does, it better than Maria Ondina Braga in a work that is paradigmatic in every respect. This writer-traveller, who is restless and restlessly in transit through writing and through the places where the Portuguese have passed, speaks about the attraction for the enigma of Macao, the mystery that is Macao.
Running away from a fate that was supposed to be natural and made women "sedentary" beings, Maria Ondina Braga left"[...] her parent's home [...]," travelled the world from west to east, and wrote about her experiences. Braga belongs to a group of women to whom, in the words of Regina Louro, "[...] wandering is the result of restlessness and of the desire to give up everything. They leave their familiar world to break loose, and the new places they see are, above all, a pretext for an interior journey whose outcome is impossible to predict upon departure."86
The last book published87 by Maria Ondina Braga, Passagem do Cabo (Beyond the Cape), is in a way a synthesis of her journey through space and writing. She writes about the wounded lands of Africa, traversing the Indian Ocean, the days in Macao, the first time "[...] twenty-five years later [...]" and always - places and times that, in the heart, are tied to the place of origin, Portugal. This happens throughout her work, from her first book, Eu Vim para Ver a Terra (I Came to See The Land) (1965), to her last. Among her other works, which include articles, short stories, an autobiography and a novel, are A China Fica ao Lado (China is Next Door) (1968), Estátua de Sal (The Statue of Salt) (1969) and Nocturno em Macao (Nocturne in Macao) (1991), to mention but those that are most directly related to the city.
The attitude of people who travel to such a variety of places and writing is one of complete openness, discreet attention, solemn renunciation and, in the end, wisdom, knowledge that transforms and also makes us different in history. The writer invents stories, but it is of history that she speaks and of people who actually exist - "us" - in Macao. This "us" is really plural, perhaps even excessively so, and it encompasses "me", "you" and "they" - the Portuguese (members of the military, teachers, nuns, myths), the Macanese (their businesses, the marriages and intrigues), the Chinese (men and women, writing, legends [...]) - who are very difficult to unite but are also very difficult to separate. Citing Vivian Ling Shu, Braga says: "Whereas history records the external events, fiction reflects the mind and soul of society." Apart from its aesthetic value, her work is important because of its subtle and in-depth analysis of the world and of Portugal scattered throughout the world, namely in the Far East.
Braga describes Estátua de Sal as a "[...] fictionalized autobiography [...]," but it is also a book of memories because the "I" of the autobiography finds herself in history (the history of sedentariness, in Braga, and of the nomadism of travel and writing). To this author, Macao is the place of revelation, the place where mystery "[...] is next door [...]": "To come to Macao, or to China, is to have the opportunity, perhaps a unique one, to come face to face with the supernatural."89 A China Fica ao Lado is a collection of stories about "old women with bound feet, sellers of exotic products, fortune tellers, women whose lives are without direction I....],"90 restless, tragic, fantastic, fascinating figures that exist between reality and dreams, and about an "I" that joins the characters for the meeting and complicity. So that China may stop "[...] being next door [...]" and "be within". A new knowledge, a new path to love, to friendship - the joy of 'being' in Macao, the feeling of "being" in Macao. This work represents an attempt to acquire knowledge: "Macao was also my curiosity and my fondness for the Chinese people, their history, their wisdom."91
Nocturno em Macao is about assumed transgression, attraction taken to the ultimate - love and death. "The land of the novel is love, which to me is a mystery and a dream [...],"92 says the author. The story is about the love between a Portuguese woman and a Chinese man, the fascination the woman feels for the Chinese 'characters' and the way she defies the established rules. Macao is presented as a place where the various Aeneas, who for some reason, are separated from their places of origin, land and permanently yearn for home. It is a place that is conducive to self-discovery and a port where the eternal travellers prepare to leave once again, leaving behind roots and taking with them 'nourishment' for later on.
Macao is like the male character in the book, who is loved by two women, one Portuguese and one Chinese. Like Esther, tied to a man who is an enigma to her, so is Portugal with Macao. And the paradox of death? Will Macao survive? Could it be that the departure of one of the characters in the novel, the little importance the other seems to accord to it, the breaking up of the triangle, will destroy an identity that lived on a happy ambiguity?
In the author's words: "Nocturne [Nocturne] foreshadows the end of the empire".93 The end of the dream of the empire but not the end of the empire of dreams. Perhaps one day the two women, who are so different but so close, will renew their ties - without walls or partitions - and share the love that exists between the three freely, transparently and in safety. Then, "[...] in the "Inn of Friendship" [the] child of the sun [...]"94 will be born.
The works of Maria Ondina Braga reveal a unique way of looking at Macao - a point of view that is not euphoric but somewhat melancholic as a result of a 'wounded wisdom' in the face of our fate and that of a city whose roads are labyrinths of Eros, travelled by indecipherable silences. In that case, Utopia, the desire to face history, the desire for a 'civilization of universal fraternity', of a space without solitude, where Eros does not lead to Thanatos.
Camilo Pessanha's question "What brought us so far?", which was asked (explicitly or otherwise) by the first arrivals in Macao and remains without a definite answer, may be what leads to the gesture, a gesture of giving rather than ownership. Although the mystery is still unsolved (after all what does this name, Macao, mean?), may the poetry remain, and once the distrust is gone, in accepting others may we be able to say with Maria Ondina Braga in Oriente (Orient) :
("To open into a rare flower.
Fragile and bare
like the flowers
found in every garden.
Oh, if only someone would gather it,
a flower thirsting for the moon,
and give it to a mandarin as a gift."95). ***
Translated from the Portuguese by: Paula Sousa
NOTES
** BATALHA, Graciete, Este nome de Macau, in "Revista de Cultura", Macau, (1) Abril/Maio/Junho [April/May/June] 1987, pp. 7-15 [Portuguese edition] -- This article contains a bibliography on the subject.
*** Revised version of a lecture given in February 1994 at the Missão de Macau (Macao Mission), in Lisbon.
1 SANTOS, Isaú, Sino-Portuguese Relations via Macao in the 16th and 17th Centuries, in "Review of Culture", Macau, (7-8) October 1988-March 1989, pp. 3-1 l, p. 6- "Therefore it can be said that it is likely that the Portuguese first reached Macao between 1555 and 1557."
2 CONCEIÇÃO JÚNIOR, António, Macao: Do Mito à Desocultação, in "Via Latina", Maio [May] 1991, Supplemento MACAO [Macao supplement], pp. 21-23, p.21.
3 SANTOS, Carlos Pinto - NEVES, Orlando, De Longe à China, 2 vols., Macao, Instituto Cultural de Macau, 1988, vol. 1, p.39 -"Over the centuries, two sides have argued over this subject: there are those who claim that Camões was in the territory and those who claim that he was never in Macao. [...] In support of the former, Diogo do Couto [...] writes in Book V of the 'Década Oitava' of his Décadas da Ásia: 'On his return from there, his ship was wrecked off the coast of Siam. His fellow passengers lost everything, but Camões was lucky to save Os Lusíadas (The Lusiads), which he mentions in the book. A very beautiful young Chinese woman, with whom he was travelling and to whom he had great obligations, perished in the wreck. In his work, Camões her 'Dinamene', and he wrote sonnets about her death, including one that says: "Alma minha gentil que te partiste [...]" ("Gentle soul of mine who is now gone [...]". Camões never refers specifically to Macao in Os Lusíadas (or for that matter in his lyrical works), but some stanzas refer to China."
4 AZEVEDO, Rafael Ávila de, Á influência da Cultura Portuguesa em Macao, Lisboa, Biblioteca Breve, [d. n. n.], p.34.
5 ("A government without power, such a bishop, a den of virtuous nuns, three monasteries, five thousand Christian "nhons" and Chinese, who are very poor workers.
A cathedral that today exists as it was,
fourteen prebendaries without a farthing,
much poverty, many vile women,
with Portuguese people, all in a corral;
Six fortresses, without soldiers, a drum
three parishes ornamented with wood
a vicar-general without a promoter.
Two colleges and one of them very bad,
a Senate that is superior to everything
that is what Portugal has in Macao.")
[My translation]
6 Venceslau de Morais (°1854-†1929) arrived in Macao on the 7th of July 1888.
7 SANTOS, Carlos Pinto - NEVES Orlando Neves, op. cit., vol.2, p.684.
8 Ibidem., p. 687.
9 Ibidem., pp. 692-93.
10 QUADROS, António, Contos, Crónicas, Cartas Escolhidas e Textos de Temática Chinesa, Lisboa, Europa-América, [d. n. n.], p. 16.
11 PESSANHA, Camilo, China, Lisboa, Agência Geral das Colónias, 19441 p.42.
12 ZEPR R. A., Ponto de Encontro das Culturas Chinesa e Portuguesa, in "Via Latina", Maio [May] 1991, Supplemento MACAU [Macau supplement], pp. 26-29-Where this opinion was corroborated. The author says: "To Chinese artists, innovation is anathema. Their art is essentially technical: centuries ago, the Chinese civilization discovered the correct way to paint a tree or to compose 'pipe' music, and that method must not be modified. Artists are simply the technicians who put the method into practice. To westerners, what is not innovative is not art, but to easterners, what is innovative is not art."
13 CUNHA, Carlos da, in "Comércio de Macao", 25 Junho [June] 1988.
14 Idem.
15 Letter to Carlos Amaro, January 1909.
16 Idem.
17 Idem.
18 SANTOS, Carlos Pinto - NEVES Orlando Neves, op. cit., vol.2, p.755.
19 CASTRO, Ferreira de, A Volta ao Mundo, Lisboa, Guimarães & Ca., 1944, p.73 - In his book, the author says: "We are behind schedule in writing the columns about our trip that we agreed to send to the Rio de Janeiro newspaper "A Noite"."
20 Ibidem., p.70.
21 Ibidem., p.71.
22 Ibidem., p.72
23 Ibidem., p.73.
24 Idem.
25 CASTRO, Ferreira de, op. cit., p.75.
26 Ibidem., p. 76.
27 Idem.
28 CASTRO, Ferreira de, op. cit., p.79.
29 Idem.
30 PIRES, Daniel, António Sérgio em Macao: Nove Cartas Inéditas, in "Revista de Cultura", Macau, 1 (7-8) Outubro [October] 1988 / Março [March] 1989, p. 110.
31 Ibidem., p. ll5.
32 Ibidem., pp. 115-116.
33 Idem.
34 Idem.
35 Idem.
36 CONCEIÇÃO JÚNIOR, António, op. cit., p. 21.
37 Ibidem., p.23.
38 There is obviously an in-depth anthropo-sociological explanation for the origin and disappearance of Macao's language.
39 BATALHA, Graciete Nogueira, A Viragem do Século e o Escritor de Macao, in "Revista de Cultura", 2 (15) Julho [July] / Setembro [September] 1991, pp. 184-187, p.185.
40 In "Tribuna de Macao", 15 Abril [April] 1989.
41 CHORÃO, João Bigotte, Couto Viana: Entre a Saudade do Passado e a Saudade do Futuro, in "Revista de Cultura", Macau, ser.2, (18) Janeiro [January] - Marco [March] 1994, pp. 223-224.
42 VIANA, António Manuel Couto, No Oriente do Oriente: Roteiro Lírico de Macau e 6 poemas, in "Revista de Cultura", Macau, 1 (1) Abril/Maio/Junho 1987, pp. 65-70, p.18.
Also see: VIANA, António Manuel Couto, In the East of the East: A lyrical Itinerary of Macau and 6 Poems, in "Review of Culture", Macau, 1 (1) April/May/ June 1987, pp. 62-67.
43 SEABRA, José Augusto, LU Ping Yi, trans., Poemas do Nome de Deus, Macau, Instituto Cultural de Macau, 1990, p.13.
44 "Tribuna de Macao", 4 Dezembro [December] 1982 (?).
45 SEABRA, José Augusto, op. cit., p. 23.
46 Ibidem., p. 75.
47 Ibidem., p. 77.
48 PESSOA, Fernando, Nevoeiro, in "Mensagem", in Obra Poética e em Prosa, Porto, Lello & Irmãos Editores, 1986, vol. 1 p. 1168 [1 st edition: Lisboa, Parceria António Maria Pereira, 1934].
49 "An extremely pure, enchanted anchoring, / in a more annunciatory Orient [...]"
50 SEABRA, José Augusto, op. cit., p.79.
51 ANDRADE, Eugénio de, YAO Jingming, trans., Com Palavras Amo, Macau, Instituto Cultural de Macau, 1990, p.13.
52 Idem.
53 Idem.
54 ANDRADE, Eugénio de, Pequeno Caderno do Oriente/ Notes from the East, in "Review of Culture", Macau, 2 (18) January/February/March 1994, p. 10 (A partially bilingual offprint inserted at the end of the issue).
55 Idem.
56 ANDRADE, Eugénio de., 1994, op. cit., p.17 (original published in Portuguese only).
57 Ibidem., p. 18
58 Ibidem., p.20.
59 CAMÕES, Luís de, Os Lusíadas, Canto I, Stanza 2.
60 ANDRADE, Eugénio de, 1994, op. cit., p.23.
61 Ibidem., p. 24 (original published in Portuguese only).
62 Eugénio de Andrade, op. cit., p. 29.
63 TORGA, Miguel, Diário XV, Coimbra, Gráfica de Coimbra, 1990.
64 Idem.
65 Idem.
66 Idem.
67 Idem.
68 Idem.
69 Idem.
70 TORGA, Miguel, Camões, Coimbra, Gráfica de Coimbra, 1987, p.8.
71 Ibidem., p.13.
72 Ibidem., p14.
73 Ibidem., p 18.
74 Ibidem., p 19.
75 TORGA, Miguel, Diário XVI, Coimbra, Gráfica de Coimbra, 1995 [1st edition: 1993].
76 SANTOS, Mário, in "Público", 18 Janeiro [January] 1995.
77 LUÍS, Agustina Bessa, The Decorated Stone, in "Review of Culture", Macau, 1 (9) January/February/March 1990, pp. 86-87.
78 Ibidem., p. 86.
79 Ibidem., pp. 86-87.
80 Ibidem., p. 87.
81 PIRES, Benjamim Videira, Espelho do Mar, Macau, Instituto Cultural de Macau, 1986, p.49.
82 Maria Ana de Magalhães Colaço Acciaioli was born in Torres Vedras on the 3rd of July 1900. She spent seven years in Macao. She died quite young on the 5th of July 1933. In reference to her, Natália Correia writes: "[...] maintaining an incontestable lyrical place in the parnassian abode of the muses, she also conquered it in a symbolism that is akin to that of the Parnassians [...]."
(CORREIA, Natália, Versos de Brisa Portuguesa Escritos numa Flor de Lótus, in "Revista de Cultura", Macau, 2 (18) January/February/March 1994, pp. 220-222).
83 Idem.
84 Idem.
85 CORREIA, Natáilia, 1994, op. cit., p. 222.
86 LOURO, Regina, in "Público", Lisboa, 29 Maio [May] 1992.
87 BRAGA, Maria Ondina A Filha do Juramento, Braga, Autores de Braga, 1995. - The Author's last publication.
89 BRAGA, Maria Ondina, Women in Twentieth-Century Chinese Literature, in "Review of Culture", Macau, 2 (15-16) September 1991/March 1992, pp. 73-76.
90 BRAGA, Maria Ondina, Passagem do Cabo, Lisboa, Caminho, 1994, p. 125.
91 Ibidem., p. 158.
92 BRAGA, Maria Ondina, in "Comércio de Macao", 22 Julho [July] 1989.
93 BRAGA, Maria Ondina, in "Jornal de Letras", Lisboa, 30 Julho [July] 1991.
94 BRAGA, Maria Ondina, A China Fica ao Lado: contos, Macau, Instituto Cultural de Macau, 1990 [1st edition: 1968; 2nd edition: 1974; 3rd edition: 1976].
95 BRAGA, Maria Ondina, 1994, op. cit., p.99.
* Doctor in Romance, Modern and Contemporary Literature.
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