Começo de um conto que veio-me cá como um pensamento buliçoso na minha ânsia de me iniciar definitivamente na literatura. Tenho-me debatido entre dous infinitos - as teorias de Fillmore, de Algirdas Greimas e outros tantos do panteão da Linguística e as concepções ora formalistas, ora sócio-candidianas da criação literária. Minhas experiências nessa área última me têm sido apenas de leitor crítico-invasivo, mas creio que os dias de homo faber litterarum já me são chegados.
Dou a lume este começo de conto nascido da premência de perlustrar a vida humana nos seus aspectos mais íntimos e pertubadores. Ele, no entanto, é tão introdutório que permite a percepção apenas do ritmo, do ambiente, dos elementos realísticos que formam a teia de uma atmosfera humana tão contemporânea, infimamente tolerável como a da Rua do Comércio, aquele curral verminoso, lugar de concretização nauseante da entropia capitalista, da despersonalização, da fragmentação.
O ruído cavernoso dos ônibus perpassava a Rua do Comércio e se baralhava às loucas vociferações dos anunciantes de produtos. Era maio, mês de tulipas e bocas-de-leão em oferta a poucos metros dali, na Rua do Livramento com bancas fartas em espécimes. Eram dez da manhã, o bafejo da brisa quente mal confortava os transeuntes que atulhavam a outrora Rua Conselheiro Sinimbu.
O bulício se estendia de ponta a ponta e desembocava no calçadão como um afluente que alimenta as águas de um rio caudaloso. Um odioso rito diário de pessoas das mais diversas. Velhos em seu passo lento e quase trôpego, crianças arrastadas por suas mães sobraçando bolsas ou embrulhos, estudantes fardados, funcionários engravatados, apressados, avezados a nada ver à sua frente a não a ser massa borrão desprezível em sua marcha interminável.
Ao longo da rua, estendem-se inúmeras paradas de ônibus que recebem uma turba invariavelmente amorfa. Vêem-se tão-somente pés, braços, pescoços, gorduras como colóides em fissão violenta. Rapidamente, entretanto, tudo se desfaz num movimento fibrilante, tal um saco cheio de vermes expelindo seus humores. É o momento de subir no ônibus, tal arca de Noé a conter espécies que podiam perfeitamente perecer no dilúvio.
By brazilian senator Cristovam Buarque during a lecture at the New York University in 2000:
“During a recent discussion, in the United States, someone asked my opinion regarding the internationalization of the Amazon Region. The youngster asserted that he expected a response of a humanist and not of a Brazilian. This was the first time anyone had established the humanist viewpoint as the starting point for my response. In fact, as a Brazilian I would have responded simply against internationalization of the Amazon Region. Even if our governments have not given the attention that this treasure deserves, it is ours. I responded that, as a humanist, realizing the risk of environmental destruction that threatens the Amazon Region, I could imagine its internationalization, just as for everything else that is important to humanity. If the Amazon Region, from a humanist΄s point of view, has to be internationalized, then we should internationalize the oil reserves of the entire the world as well. Oil is just as important to the well being of humanity as the Amazon Region for our future. Nevertheless, the owners of oil reserves feel it is in their right to increase or decrease oil production and to raise or lower the price. The rich of the world, feel they have the right to burn this valuable possession of humanity. Similarly, the financial capital of the wealthy nations should be internationalized. If the Amazon Region is a natural reserve for every human being, then it could not be burned down by the decision of a landowner or a country. To burn down the Amazon Region is so tragic, as the unemployment provoked by the arbitrary decisions of world wide speculators. We cannot permit that the world΄s financial reserves serve to burn down entire nations according to the whims of speculacion. Before the (internationalization of the) Amazon Region, I would like to see the internationalization of all the world΄s great museums. The Lourve cannot belong only to France. Each museum in the world is a guardian for the most beautiful works produced by the human genius. It cannot be permitted that these cultural possessions, as the natural posession of the Amazon Region, can be manipulated or be destroyed according to the whims of an owner or a country. Recently, a Japanese millionaire decided to have a painting of a grand master burried with him in the grave. This painting should have been internationalized. At the time of the meeting, in which this question came up, the United Nations convened the Forum of the Millennium and the presidents of several countries had difficulties in attending due to barriers (they faced) at the border. Therefore, I contend that New York, as the base of the United Nations, should be internationalized. At least Manhattan should belong to all of humanity. Similarly Paris, Venice, Rome, London, Rio de Janeiro, Brazilia, Recife, every city with its own beauty, its own history should belong to the whole world. If the United States wants to internationalize the Amazon Region, due to the risk of leaving it in Brazilian hands, then we should internationalize all the nuclear stockpiles of the United States. Particularly since they have already shown that they are capable of using these weapons, causing a destruction thousands of times greater than the sad fires taken place in the Brazilian forests. During their debates, the current U.S. presidential candidates have defended the idea of internationalizing the world forest reserves in exchange for the debt. We could begin to use this debt to guarantee the right of every child in the world to attend school. We could internationalize the children treating all of them, regardless of their birthplace, as a posession which deserves the care and attention of the entire world. Even more so than the Amazon Region. When the world leaders attend to the world΄s poor children as possessions of Humanity, they will no longer permit that these children work when they should be studying, that they die when they should be living. As a humanist I accept to defend the internationalization of the world. So long as the world treats me as a Brazilian, I will fight so that our Amazon Region will be ours. Only ours.”
Cristovam Buarque is Professor of Brasilia University, ex-governor of Brasilia, D.F. and Brazilian Senator). As reported in the Brazilian Daily O Globo on the 23rd of October, 2000.Translation found: http://1drop.wordpress.com/2008/05/07/internationalization-of-the-world-cristovam-buarque/
