Graphic design Kiko Farkas / Máquina Estúdio e Mateus Valadares / Máquina Estúdio
21.00 x 14.00 cm, 432 pp. ISBN 9788535916027 99,90
War of the Saints A Tale of Witchcraft Novel, 1988 | Afterword by Yvonne Maggie
The statue of Saint Barbara had never left the church of Santo Amaro da Purificação before, but requested for show at an exhibition of religious art, it vacated its perch on the altar and made its way to the city of Bahia. The fishing boat Voyager without a Port, with Captain Manuel at its helm, turned into All Saint’s Bay carrying on-board the image of the Catholic saint. The sculpture’s destination: The Museum of Sacred Art, where the director, Dom Maximiliano von Gruden, a German friar, was waiting to display her before journalists and the population at large, proud of his recently completed study on the authorship of the piece. Upon her arrival, and to general surprise, Saint Barbara transmutes into the orisha Iansã, rushes up the ramp to the Market and off toward the Lacerda elevator, where she disappears among the masses. In Salvador, she is on a mission to finish something started months earlier, one Bonfim Thursday, when she helped the young and shapely Manela with the traditional washing of the church steps. Now the divinity plans to free Manela’s spirit from the clutches of her commandeering aunt Adalgisa. In this book filled with contagious good humour and graceful style, a Catholic Saint assumes the identity of a candomblé goddess in order to teach the best in life - joy and tolerance - to those she meets along the way. It is a story that could only be told in the Bahia of Jorge Amado, where everything mixes and where no distinction is made between virtue and sin, good sense and absurdity, faith and witchery, offering and miracle.
Jorge Amado mulled over the project for War of the Saints for twenty years. The story began to take shape back in the 60s under the intended title of A guerra dos santos, incidentally the title it was given in English, The War of the Saints. Finally written in Paris between 1987 and 1988, the book was published that same year with illustrations by Carybé. The story is set during the period of its original inception, in the late 60s, early 70s, as the author himself notes in the book. The plot is brief, unfolding over a period of 48 hours, but Jorge Amado stretches the story out and captivates the reader with exuberant and gripping style, making War of the Saints one of his longest novels. Written when the author was 75 years old, the book synthesizes the dominant strands of Jorge Amado’s work, containing all his favourite themes -- miscegenation, sensuality, religious syncretism --, woven together with the hallmarks of his mature prose, such as the blend of light humour and refined construction, allied with rich description of customs, parties, candomblé, the city of Salvador and the historical moment. The story contains references to personalities from Bahia, such as Dona Canô, mother of Caetano Veloso, the artist Carybé, the composer Dorival Cayammi, the obá Camafeu de Oxóssi and Mother Menininha do Gantois, among other real-life figures. The book was published in Portugal and translated into various languages.
Overwhelmed by a feeling of relief, of well-being, the all-consuming argent desire to live, an insidious euphoria, a sweet sadness, the liberated swallow flapped her wings, ready to take flight and discover the world. Manela laughed wildly. On the square around the basilica and on the streets at the foot of the Sacred Hill, the people had started Carnival: A month and a half of frolicking and merrymaking would follow, of endless celebration because so one should have to tolerate the harshness of life uninterrupted for a whole year. The gift of celebrating festivities even under calamitous conditions belongs exclusively to our people as a favor from Our Lord of Bomfim and Oxalá: The two together add up to one, the God of Brazilians, Bahia born. Samba groups and afoxés paraded by, the Children of Gandhi gave their first performance of the year, and the melodies from music trucks across the horizon of houses on stilts barely raised above the water and mud in the swamp of Alagados. The urchins called captains-of-the-sands went through the crowd peddling Bomfim ribbons, medals and scapulars, colored figures of saints, clenched-fist figas and leather-bag patuás.
