Depiction of Cycles of Domestic Abuse and Violence Against Women in Mia Couto’s “Baralho Erótico”

Résumé

The representation of the plights of women in literary works has always been an interestingly relevant theme that is discussed in academic and non-academic settings. This is because women have been submitted to different forms of inhumane treatments, in one way or another, which have led to physical and psychological trauma and consequently death. In this regard, this essay aims to provide a textual analysis of an extract from “Baralho Erótico” in the book Contos do Nascer da Terra written by a renowned luso-mozambican biologist and writer, António Emílio Leite Couto, popularly known as Mia Couto, who through his publications has treated different subject-matters on sociocultural, historical and political lives of Mozambicans. The essay which reflects on the theme of domestic
violence and on aspect of Mozambican Literature and society is informed by feminist ideas defended by Annette Kolodny (1980), Chris Weedon (1987), Davies and Anne (1986), Simone de Beauvoir (1989) among others, depicted the violent and abusive relationships between the two central characters in the story by stressing the harrowing and traumatic experience of the female character who is highly brutalised and dehumanised by the male character. It demonstrated the interplay of gender and underlined patriarchal ideologies which encourage and
facilitate misogyny and violence against women. It also emphasised how women passively struggle to overcome these abuses.