Beyond the glass: dialogues with «Rear window: emergency chronicles», by Isabel Cristina Mateus

Abstract

That March of 2020 brought a new reality to the world that, after three years, would never be the same: telecommuting was instituted, the house began to be valued more as both a home and a space for introspection. That pandemic year of 2020 marked a milestone in Portuguese literature, especially in a genre that allowed itself to be written simultaneously with the events, bearing witness to the sanitary war outside and the internal conflicts experienced by the chronicler who, looking at himself, also used the window of perception to observe others. This article aims to propose a reflection on how literary chronicles, particularly Isabel Cristina Mateus' anthology, documented a cleansing time, with as much fear as inner/outer discovery.