Authorship Beyond theory

An approach by Bernardo Guimarães and Machado de Assis in primary sources

Abstract

This article aims to investigate, from the study of primary sources, issues related to authorship in publications by Bernardo Guimarães and Machado de Assis, in view of the editorial processes involved in the construction of the authorial figures worked here. The analysis of the contractual relations between the authors and Baptiste-Louis Garnier, the most important bookseller-publisher of the period, are fundamental for the construction of reading hypotheses based on the negotiations about the sale of the works and the copyright in question. During the period studied, debates about the literary property of the works were dividing opinions in society, and they became even more expressive in the second half of the 19th century, which is precisely the time when the aforementioned authors began to gain notoriety and to consecrate themselves as important figures in Brazilian literature.