Brazilian short stories

Brazilian short stories by José Bento Monteiro Lobato is a collection of short stories written in the early 20th century. It uses sharp, satirical fiction to examine Brazilian society, from petty politics and bureaucracy to rural life and social pretenses.

An opening introduction frames the author as a nationalist satirist whose fiction doubles as civic protest. The three tales then cut to the bone: in “Modern Torture,” a small-town mail carrier, Izé Biriba, is crushed by patronage, endless errands, and public mockery, ultimately sabotaging an election and vanishing to escape his misery. “The Penitent Wag” follows Pontes, a lifelong joker desperate to be taken seriously; he schemes to make a frail tax collector laugh to death to secure the post, succeeds, is wracked by guilt, misses his chance anyway, and finally hangs himself—only to be laughed at once more. “The Plantation Buyer” portrays a failing farm whose owner stages deceptions to snare a buyer; a charming impostor woos the family and leaves, later returns genuinely wealthy to purchase the place, but is beaten off in rage, and the family loses its last hope as the daughter’s romantic dreams collapse. (This is an automatically generated summary.)