The co-author reader in "Augusta" and "Um conto límpido e obscuro", by Sérgio Sant'Anna

Abstract

A reading of the short stories “Augusta” e “Um conto límpido e obscuro”, from the book Anjo Noturno (2017), is presented, based on the co-authorship role assumed by the reader in metafictional writing. The main aim is to understand that the reader, when induced, contributes to the abandonment of the idea that the text is unique and the text requires a position from the reader in relation to his active participation in the elaboration of the narrative’s meaning. Marked by visible innovations, both in terms of formal and thematic experimentation, work of a metafictional nature makes the reader feel strange, shaking their expectations, asking them to behave critically in interpretation, rather than a merely naive and passive consumption of texts. It is visible in the metafictional narrative that the reader draws his own conclusions. In the short stories, Sérgio Sant'Anna points out elements that require the reader’s counterpart as a co-author and, at the same time, a critic of/in the construction of the plot's meanings. Therefore, the bibliographical study draws on the reflections of Hans Robert Jauss (1979) and Wolfgang Iser (1996) and, for such an analysis, the authors Linda Hutcheon (1984) and Patrícia Waugh (1985) are presented as the main theoretical foundations.