A Discussion about Antonio Candido

Abstract

This brief essay addresses a relevant issue: the role of taste in the selection, description and interpretation of relevant literary events of the past. Consideration of the historicist training works signed by Antonio Candido – whether the fundamental work Formação da Literatura Brasileira, or the didactic Presença da Literatura Brasileira, carried out in partnership with José Aderaldo Castello – allows us to discern not only the operative literary taste, but its consequences for the valorization or devaluation of works and authors from the past. Another objective of this article is to provide elements to think about the permanence of this pattern of taste in later historical or critical works on Brazilian literature.