7,000 strings will be digitized by Casa de Rui Barbosa

The words of the pioneers of printed cordel in Brazil and many of their successors will be part of a digitized collection at Fundação Casa de Rui Barbosa, a federal institution that keeps one of the most important collections of the literary genre in the country.

The project is in its initial phase and will cover 7,000 of the 9,000 works at Casa de Ruy Barbosa, which have not yet been digitized. The other 2,000 have already received a digital version.

The process should last throughout 2019, and publication online for the public will depend on the approval of each cordelist or their family. In the case of works that are already in the public domain, availability on the internet is already guaranteed.

The foundation's collection is much sought after by researchers because it contains works from the early 20th century. At that time, cordel gained its first printed versions with authors such as Leandro Gomes de Barros from São Paulo, known as the “prince of poets”.

We also have Carlos Drummond de Andrade, and Francisco Chagas Batista, from Paraíba, who in 1905 told the life of cangaceiro Antônio Silvino in eight pages that begin with the following presentation:

“I will tell the public

the story of my life

The crimes I committed,

How I became homicidal,

And why do I judge my soul

Eternally lost”.

The work is coordinated by the director of the Center for Memory and Information at Casa de Rui Barbosa, Ana Ligia Medeiros.

She says that the collection began to form when Sebastião Nunes Batista, son of Francisco Chagas Batista, donated his private collection to the foundation.

In addition to being a servant at the Casa de Rui Barbosa, Sebastião was also a poet and organized an anthology of cordel literature.

The collection of rare strings donated by Sebastião grew with other donations from intellectuals, artists and researchers.

“If they are not organized by an institution, these works end up being lost because the material is delicate”, ponders Ana Lígia.

She believes it is impossible to have a collection of all Brazilian cordel production, because many copies end up getting lost in the homes of readers or the cordelists themselves. “Digitization plays a role in preserving memory”.

With the collection digitized and available on the internet, the director believes that scholars from all over the country will be able to enrich their research on the subject, and teachers will be able to use cordel as paradidactic material with more ease.

“Since the beginning, the cordel has had the function of communicating current events quickly and with a very peculiar vision. It is a record of customs,” she says, adding:

“It has an accessible language and there is a possibility of using it as paradidactic material even in elementary school. And so we preserve the country's own culture”.

Ana Lígia says that themes such as nature, love and current affairs of each era and region are recorded in the history of cordel, which in popular language builds beautiful verses. The information is from Agência Brasil.