Cunha, Eneida Leal, org. Leituras criticas sobre Silviano Santiago. Belo Horizonte: Editora UFMG; Sao Paulo: Editora Fundacao Perseu Abramo, 2008. 238 pp (original) (raw)

2010, Luso-Brazilian Review

Anthologies are oft en the unsung heroes of college literary survey courses. Th e anthology chosen for the class oft en defi nes the Portuguese literary canon for the (U.S.) graduate student who sees the text selections as their introduction to the history of Portuguese literature. For more advanced scholars, the anthology provides an opportunity to deepen their knowledge or to specialize in a particular theme, genre, time period or author. At the very least, anthologies provide easy and convenient access to a wide variety of texts, many of which may no longer exist outside of national archives. Th roughout Patricia Anne Odber de Baubeta's text, the author and reader are constantly engaging with the underlying question: What is the ultimate purpose of the literary anthology? Is it literary historiography, literary criticism, social criticism, simply a compilation of texts linked by time, topic and language-or some mixture thereof? While the text does, at times, come across as a routine listing of anthologies and authors, overall the book remains true to its initial purpose: "to explore anthologies produced in Portugal from a multidisciplinary perspective that draws on literary studies, literary historiography, sociology of reading, gender studies, cultural studies, among others" (28-29). Baubeta defi nes the anthology as "a compilation of self-standing poems or short stories, deliberately selected and organised in such a way as to serve the editor's purpose" (34) and specifi cally focuses on anthologies published in Portugal containing Portuguese literature (although some anthologies also included translations of foreign literature) during the course of the twentieth century. She begins her chronological survey of anthologies based on the year of publication, starting in 1907 and ends with texts published up to 2007. In this way, she is able to show how literary tastes change and evolve-oft entimes infl uenced by the very anthologies that she analyzes-and how the role of the anthologist goes beyond the mere choosing of texts, at times demonstrating political or socially rebellious leanings. Baubeta also contends that while the content of anthologies may be studied at length, the composition of the anthology itself and the editor's choice of texts are much more infrequently studied. Th is