Orphans of Eldorado - Milton Hatoum [38]
It was a love story, with a dramatic slant, as happens almost always in literature, and, sometimes, in life. This story also evoked an Amazonian myth: the Enchanted City.
Many natives and dwellers on the banks of the Amazon believed—and still believe—that at the bottom of the river or lake there exists a rich, splendid city, a model of harmony and social justice, where people live as enchanted beings. They are seduced and taken to the bottom of the river by the inhabitants of the waters or the jungle (generally a river dolphin or an anaconda) and only return to our world with the mediation of a shaman, whose body or spirit has the power to go to the Enchanted City, talk to its inhabitants, and, perhaps, bring them back to our world.
I remember my grandfather spent some hours telling this story, and I listened entranced by his eloquence and his theatrical gestures.
Years later, when I read the accounts of the Amazon written by conquistadors and European travellers, I realised that the myth of Eldorado was one of the possible versions and variations of the Enchanted City, which in the Amazon region is also called a legend. Myths which are part of the Indo-European inheritance, but which are also part of Amerindian culture and of many others. For myths, like cultures, travel and are interlinked. They belong to history and to collective memory.
I asked my grandfather where he had heard the story of the orphans. Years later, when I was travelling in the middle reaches of the Amazon, I looked for the narrator in the town he mentioned. He lived in the same house my grandfather had described, and was so old that he didn’t know his own age. He refused to tell his story:
‘I’ve already told it once, to a river trader who came this way and had the goodness to listen to me. Now my memory is very dim, it’s lost its strength . . .’
Glossary
amapá: (Hancornia amapa) a tree with white wood and which exudes a white gum used in medicine.
beiju: a light ball made of toasted manioc flour, often sold in packets in the streets.
Booth Line: the main steamship line plying between Liverpool, Portugal, Madeira, the Azores, and up the Amazon to Belém, Manaus, and as far as Iquitos in Peru.
caboclo: a person of mixed indigenous and European descent.
Cabanos Revolt (1835–1840): Also known as the Cabanagem, this was a violent revolt against the political elite of Pará, notable for being almost exclusively supported by the poor and the indigenous population.
cavaquinho: a small guitar, similar to a ukelele, very widespread in Brazil and used in folk ensembles.
Cesário Verde (1855–1886): One of the most important and individual Portuguese poets of the nineteenth century, the first to free himself of romantic sentimentality and move towards a realism influenced by Baudelaire.
cuiarana: large tree (Buchenaria grandis) with red flowers and inedible fruit the size and colour of olives.
farofa: a dish made of manioc flour, fried with pieces of egg, meat etc. It is often used as a stuffing.
guaraná: a climbing plant (Paullinia cupana) native to the Amazon, whose fruit is used to make a fizzy drink very popular throughout Brazil. See sateré-maué below.
jaçanã: a water bird (Jacana spinosa) similar to rails and moorhens, with long toes allowing it to walk on floating plants.
jambeiro, jambo: a tree of Asian origin (Eugenia jambos), with pink fruit (jambo), known in English as rose apple.
jambu: a herb of the Compositae (Wulffia stenoglossa), with yellow flowers. Its leaves are eaten boiled and used to flavour rice.
jatobá: a tree of the Leguminosae (Hymenaea courbaril) found throughout much of Brazil, and exploited for its wood.
língua geral: a language of indigenous, Tupi origin, though with European influence, and much used