Senhora: Profile of a Woman.

• Author: Mujica, Barbara

Although the nineteenth-century author Jose de Alencar has been called the father of Brazilian literature, his name is hardly a household word outside of his native country. With her fine translation of Senhora, one of Alencar's most poignant works, Catarina Feldmann Edinger attempts to rectify this situation by making the work available to a wide international audience.

In many ways Senhora is an archetypal romantic novel. Great passions come into play as an upright, independent individual clashes head-on with a corrupt, materialistic society. What is different here is that the protagonist is a woman--not an impulsive, frenzied romantic heroine like Espronceda's Dona Elvira or Zorrilla's Dona Ines, but a clever, determined, calculating woman who knows her own mind and controls her own affairs. Here, senhora does not mean Mrs. or lady, but mistress--the feminine of master. Edinger writes in her introduction that she chose this novel to translate precisely because of Alencar's portrayal of a strong, clear-thinking nineteenth-century woman.

Aurelia, a poor but beautiful and virtuous girl, lives with her mother in a drab part of Rio de Janeiro. Although many local dandies display an interest in her, Aurelia only has eyes for the handsome Fernando Rodrigues de Seixas, who courts her enthusiastically. Seixas assures Dona Emilia, Aurelia's mother, that his intentions are honorable and include marriage, but his ardor cools when Manuel Tavares do Amaral offers him his own daughter, Adelaide, along with a substantial dowry.

Given to the good life, Seixas has squandered his family's meager resources. Now, overcome with anxiety over his financial problems and the responsibilities that matrimony will entail, he flees Rio. As usual in romantic novels, quirks of fate move the action into high gear. Aurelia's long-lost grandfather dies, leaving her a fortune. Suddenly thrust into elegant society, she becomes the most dazzling, sought-after young woman around. But Aurelia still wants Seixas.

Humiliated by his disdain, but still madly in love, she makes him an offer through an agent: a hundred thousand miles if he will marry the anonymous donor. Seriously in debt, Seixas accepts, and is ecstatic to discover afterward that his betrothed is Aurelia. His rapture turns to horror, however, when on his wedding night she rebukes him bitterly, accusing him of betrayal and crass materialism. Seixas admits he married for money; since he sold himself, he will...