The ANGELIC DAWN OF THE WHITE WOMAN AND THE DANGEROUS TWILIGHT OF THE BLACK WOMAN

SEXUALIZING FEMALE BODIES IN VINICIUS DE MORAES

Abstract

The lyrical and romantic poems of Vinicius de Moraes (1913-1980) echo Brazilian culture in the most diverse artistic manifestations, especially in literature and music. A renowned poet from the second phase of Modernism in Brazil, the romantic content of Vinicius' poetry exalts the overwhelming love and beauty of the female body in sweet, simple, and tender verses. However, when we observe the description of the black woman's body in foul and sexual words, it is necessary to ask: after all, to whom are words of pure love, with angelic delight, intended, and to whom are words about filthy sex, of infernal pleasure? Therefore, the poems present in the work Antologia Poética (2009) will be analyzed, in which it will be possible to notice the contrast between the bodies of white women and black women and how the latter, based on the articulation between racism, sexism, and nation, suffers physical and symbolic violence from the colonial period to the contemporary. It will reflect on how the poetic description of female bodies in Moraes' poetry, in Modernism, dialogues with that of Gregório de Matos (1636-1696), in the Baroque, reinforcing colonial thoughts such as the purity of white women and the sexual immorality of black women, using as methodology the works of intellectuals Lélia Gonzalez (1984, 2020), Sueli Carneiro (2019), Patricia Hill Collins (2019), and intellectual Stuart Hall (2016).