"DEVERIA TER PERGUNTADO SEU NOME"

UMA LEITURA DA VELHICE EM "SWIMMING LESSONS, DE ROHINTON MISTRY

Abstract

This article aims at analyzing the short story “Swimming Lessons”, by the Indian writer Rohinton Mistry, taking two thematic axes into account: the female aging process, which, combined with expressions of sexuality, is observed with disgust, and old age, which at first is contemplated with contempt and, afterwards, is seen as an inexorable aspect of human condition. The study also reflects upon how those thematic axes appear to be decisive in the organization of the narrative structure of the short story, here examined from compositional premises proposed by Edgar Allan Poe in “The Philosophy of Composition”, published in 1846. The analysis and interpretation of the literary text draws on theoretical perspectives developed by Simone de Beauvoir (1070) and Susan Sontag (1972).