THE “FATO COMPLETO” OF LUANDINO VIEIRA AND MIA COUTO

Abstract

From the element of the "fato" ("suit" but also the name of a angolan dish and, yet, in Brazilian Portuguese, "fact") and its multiple meanings in Portuguese, we propose here a comparative reading between the texts "O fato completo de Lucas Matesso", by Luandino Vieira, and "O embondeiro que sonhava pássaros", by Mia Couto. We believe that, with different strategies in the insertion of the "fato" in these tales, the writers structure their narratives in order to reveal the Portuguese colonial oppression in their countries, fundamentally the oppression suffered by the most excluded strata of society. While the Mozambican writer uses the element of the "fato"/suit as a symbol of European culture to then criticize colonialism, Luandino uses the polysemy of Portuguese transformed by the Angolan people to criticize the colonial regime, a polysemy that, it is worth saying, does not exists in the Portuguese colonial self-sufficient notion.