A LENTE E O PINCE-NEZ: MACHADO DE ASSIS, ESPINOSA E A CULTURA POLÍTICA NO BRASIL

In A Sereníssima República, Machado de Assis shows, through allegory, some fundamental problems of the brazilian political system. A kind of culture of fraud would be present in the behaviors of spiders (these act as citizens of the republic, in the allegory proposed in the story), which would make it impossible to implement the law and the institution of peace and securitas. Sérgio Buarque de Holanda, analyzing the period in which the tale took place indicates by means of primary sources the same problems that Machado de Assis pointed out in the tale. Lastly, some Spinoza’s political concepts are used to show that an imperium in which laws are constantly violated is not far from the state of nature, with great danger of death for the citizens. Is this the case of the republic of the tale and of Brazil nowadays?