MODELOS GARRETTIANOS DE CONSTRUÇÃO DE PERSONAGENS

Abstract

The birth of Portuguese modern fiction is due to Almeida Garrett’s pioneer writing, in the first quarter of nineteenth century. Amongst the writer’s eclectic production two novels rise, both published in his mature years; but the author’s archives reveal a long-term exploratory work on new narrative genres, such as ‘roman d’actualité’. My intention is thus to analyse this literary apprenticeship of the novelist. The manuscripts – left in different stages of elaboration – clearly show that Garrett’s novels are character-driven narratives: it is possible to observe, for instance, how the actantial model first used in dramatic works has been adapted into more complex methods of portrayal; or how the fictional character assembles the semantic axes of the text during its composition process.