SOURCE: "Machado de Assis between Romance and Satire: 'A Parasita Azul'," in What's Past is Prologue: A Collection of Essays in Honor of L. J. Woodward, edited by Salvador Bacarisse, and others, Scottish Academic Press, 1984, pp. 57-69.

In the following essay, Gledson discusses the parallels between the story "A Parasita Azul" and the plots of Machado's major novels. The critic argues that the story, when read as satire rather than straight-forward romance, can be better understood as a forerunner of Machado's later novels, which are more overtly concerned with social and political criticism.

"A Parasita Azul" is the opening story of Machado de Assis' second collection, Histórias da Meia-Noite (1873): it was first published in the preceding year, in four parts, in the Jornal das Familias. It is not an undiscovered masterpiece, but it is a surprising work which does not merit the almost complete critical neglect which...