Brazilian Ambassador hosts to celebrate litterateur Maria Filomena

The Ambassador of the Federative Republic of Brazil, João Tabajara de Oliveira Junior and Sandra Esteves Tabajara de Oliveira, arranged a programme at their residence in Dhaka to celebrate the Brazilian writer Maria Filomena Bouissou Lepecki, who, for the first time, is participating Dhaka Lit Fest 2019.

The ambassador delivered the welcome address, while Maria Filomena elaborated her literary works on the eve of Dhaka Lit Fest 2019. Her new novel, The Istanbul Bridge, was published in both Portuguese and English, was also pre-launched at the ceremony.

Maria Filomena Bouissou Lepecki is an award-winning Brazilian author, as well as a renowned doctor. In 1999, she took part in an expedition with the Brazilian army to research the Paraguayan War (1864-1870). This ten-day expedition greatly influenced her first novel Cunhatai, which received the Conrado Wessel Foundation Award (2002), the Writer’s Revelation Award (2003) as well as the Best Book of the Year Award (2003).

“Before starting to write the novel, I went through the same path and crossed the same rivers with the Brazilian army. There were 80 soldiers and 15 officers and people from the military school were among others in the group,” said Maria Filomena Bouissou Lepecki.  “I joined the expedition to reenact the episode of the Paraguay War, which was a very dramatic episode. A lot of people died and many suffered the deadly war. I did the expedition so that I could have a better taste, and sense. All the smells, listening to bird’s chirping and experiencing the vast landscape over there helped me in the description and developing the characters of the novel.”     

The novel, Cunhatai, pays attention to a barely represented segment in historiography. It is directed towards the War of the Triple Alliance Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay, including the interpretation of the conflict from a female point of view. The book employs another stratagem to erase the notion of nation and its unfolding: the dual nationality.