A ESCRAVA ISAURA

A Escrava Isaura 8.52 · 8.52

'If you had a soul'

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se tivesses alma, Leoncio, terias considerado Isaura como tua irmã,

Word by word

sesiiftivessesti-VE-seshyou hadalmaAL-maa soul,Leonciole-ON-si-uLeôncio,teriaste-REE-ashyou would haveconsideradokon-si-de-RA-duregardedIsaurai-ZAU-raIsauracomoKO-muastuaTU-ayourirmãeer-MÃsister,

The setting

if you had a soul, Leôncio, you would have regarded Isaura as your sister,

A note on this passage

The reproach cuts to the bone: 'se tivesses alma,' if you had a soul — she tells her husband, plainly, that he has none. And the claim she makes is radical for 1875: that he should have held Isaura 'como tua irmã,' as his sister — a slave and a master as siblings, equals in the family's love. It is Malvina's decency and the novel's abolitionist heart speaking through her outrage.

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