Militarism and pacifism in Euclides da Cunha

the Canudos case

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.30620/pdi.v12n2.p61

Keywords:

War conflicts, War of Canudos, Militarists, Pacifists, José Ortega y Gasset, Max Scheler, Euclides da Cunha

Abstract

This essay discusses two notions inherent to Euclides da Cunha's thought: militarism and pacifism. Based on the biography and epistolary statements of the Brazilian writer, I seek a way to understand his position regarding military conflicts in general and, more particularly, the war in Canudos. My intention, in establishing such a discussion, was to warn possible interpreters of the War of Canudos about the risk of, hurriedly or recklessly, concluding that Euclides embraced militarism blindly or definitively. I hope that through our analysis and by listing certain pacifist figures of the 19th and 20th centuries and, mainly, with the support of José Ortega Gasset's acute comments on Max Scheler's ideas about war – it will be possible to better understand the trajectory which the author of Os sertões traveled, who, on the one hand, adheres to the ideology of the Army in an early moment of his adult life and, on the other, soon renounces it to embrace peaceful or diplomatic solutions between nations.

[Received on: November 20, 2022 – Accepted on: December 15, 2022]

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Author Biography

Leopoldo Marcos Garcia Lopes Bernucci, University of California, Davis - California/USA

Possui doutorado em Doutorado em Literatura Hispano-Americana e Língua pela University of Michigan (1986).

References

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Published

2023-02-07

How to Cite

BERNUCCI, L. M. G. L. Militarism and pacifism in Euclides da Cunha: the Canudos case. Pontos de Interrogação – Journal of Cultural Criticism, Alagoinhas-BA: Laboratório de Edição Fábrica de Letras - UNEB, v. 12, n. 2, p. 61–78, 2023. DOI: 10.30620/pdi.v12n2.p61. Disponível em: https://revistas.uneb.br/index.php/pontosdeint/article/view/16401. Acesso em: 17 jul. 2024.