Accumulating Literary Prestige in the Careers of Chico Buarque and Silviano Santiago

Abstract

This article studies the careers of Brazilian writers Chico Buarque and Silviano Santiago as recipients of the Camões and Oceanos prizes to better understand the dynamics of literary prestige in Portuguese. While both honor writers throughout the Portuguese-speaking world, the prizes differ slightly in scope with the Camões deemed the most prestigious recognition of a living author’s lifetime achievement, and the Oceanos awarding the best books published each year. By analyzing the Oceanos-winning texts by Buarque and Santiago as part of their overall corpus, this article identifies a shared interest in how the circulation of people, ideas, and objects can transform ideas of national culture and identity. Lived experiences of the “space in-between” have resulted in thematic affinities that contribute to the visibility and circulation of their literary texts among a broader Portuguese-language readership, which, in turn, helps to accumulate literary prestige.