The fall of the patriarchal house

In this research we intend to study the representation of women in the novel The Dead Girl by Cornelio Penna. The author of four novels: Fronteira (1935), Dois Romances de Nico Horta (1939), Repouso (1948) and Menina Morta (1954). In these works, the author analyses the world of the characters who live in the Vale do Paraiba region, on coffee plantations and former mining companies, during the Second Empire. In the work that will be the subject of our study, The Dead Girl, the action takes place on a farm in Porto Novo, a place isolated by mountains, in a region degraded by the action of man. The people, isolated in themselves, worn down by their heavy, monotonous daily lives, seem like souls inhabiting a ghostly house. Blacks and whites feel the weight of loneliness and anguish, mourning the loss of the only breath of life, the only link between the big house and the slave quarters: the dead girl. In this research we intend to analyse how the female universe is inserted into this environment. Cornelio Penna is praised by critics for the detail with which he explores the female mind.