PATRIARCHAL WORLDVIEW AND STRUCTURAL VIOLENCE IN SÃO BERNARDO BY GRACILIANO RAMOS

Abstract

This article presents a critical analysis of the novel São Bernardo by Graciliano Ramos, focusing on the autobiographical narrative of Paulo Honório as a revealing instrument of the mechanisms of power, violence, intellectual alienation, and patriarchal worldview embedded in Brazilian society during the first half of the twentieth century. Drawing on perspectives from authors such as Foucault and Deleuze, the study demonstrates how power operates diffusely, through symbolic domination and discursive practices that reinforce the protagonist’s brutality. Violence, far from being restricted to physical acts, is structured as a strategic technique of control, affecting subjectivities and silencing resistance. Within his relationship with Madalena, the woman is turned into an object of possession, highlighting a process of reification that culminates in her death. Thus, Paulo Honório is portrayed not only as a violent agent but also as a product of a system that legitimizes exclusion and repression. His autobiographical narrative emerges as a space of bitter confession, where personal failure becomes a reflection of the dehumanization wrought by power.