BRAZILIAN HEART

NOVEMBER 2009

SINCE 1998

For me Halloween is a mix of Brazilian Carnaval and São Cosme e São Damião Day. Everybody knows what Carnaval is all about, but few people knows what São Cosme e São Damião is. September 27 in Brasil is considered the Day of Saint Cosme and Saint Damião, the twin brothers who protects children (pharmacists and doctors as well.) On that day people distribute candy to the kids and food to the poor. In Bahia, they are called “orixás Ibeji.” The legend says they were born in Arabia of Christian parents on the V Century. They were healers who ended up persecuted and killed accused of witchcraft. 

SHOWS:

Tuesday, November 10

With Oscar Castro-Neves

@ AT&T Performing Arts Center (Dallas, TX)

http://www.dallasperformingarts.org/tickets/production.aspx?performanceNumber=4984

Saturday, November 28 at 8pm

With Viver Brasil

@ Japan America Theatre

Also featuring Shakti Dance Cia and Halau Keali’I O Nalani

Presented by World Festival of Sacred Music

www.wac.ucla.edu/cip

THE QUEEN OF BRAZILIAN THEATER

The Brazilian actress Fernanda Montenegro turned 80 years old this last October. On her birthday, the editor in chief of one of the biggest newspapers in Brasil ( O Globo ) asked her to choose and edit all the articles of the Section B (Arts) of the paper. It was a present to her and to Brasil.

If you don’t know her work, here’s a link to her interview with David Letterman when she as nominated for Best Actress for “Central Station” (1998 movie directed by Walter Salles.)

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Kc67K_-e7M

BRAZILIAN POETRY

In 1987 Fernanda Montenegro brought to the stage “Dona Doida” (Miss Crazy,) a stage play with texts by Brazilian poet Adelia Prado.

Here’s a poem called Lesson from “Bagagem” (Baggage) translated by Ellen Watson. I still have this book that a sweet poet friend gave me in Rio. Enjoy.

“It was a shadowy yard, walled high with stones.

The trees held early apples, dark

Wine-colored skin, the perfected flavor of things

Ripe before their time.

Clay jugs sat alongside the wall.

I ate apples and sipped the purest water,

Knowing the outside world had stopped dead from heat:

Then my father appeared and tweaked my nose,

And he wasn’t sick and hadn’t died either;

That’s why he was laughing, blood

Stirring in his face again,

He was hunting for ways to spend this happiness:

Where’s my chisel, my fishing pole,

What happened to my snuffbox, my coffee cup?

I always dream something’s taking shape,

Nothing is ever dead.

What seems to have died fertilizes.

What seems motionless waits.”

http://books.google.com/books?id=aJ_vcxsI-1YC&pg=PR10&lpg=PR10&dq=Fernanda+Montenegro,+Adélia+Prado&source=bl&ots=TMp9pUOaHy&sig=XO3jpuSL3hVOpCiJfv46JaULJwE&hl=en&ei=3cLvSrnqK4_qsQPcsZmFBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CBIQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=&f=false

Peace,

Katia  : )