The construction of an implied reader in the short story “Introdução ao Passo da Guanxuma”, by Caio Fernando Abreu

Abstract

Passo da Guanxuma is a fictional city created by Caio Fernando de Abreu, in 1984, which became recurrent inside the literary production of this author. Present in several texts, Passo approaches special characteristics, characters and actions. This approach stands out in the short story “Introdução ao Passo da Guanxuma”, which belongs to the book Ovelhas Negras. From the concepts of “implied reader” and “voids” proposed by Wolfgang Iser, we seek, in this study, to perceive how this short story creates textually a “profile” of a reader capable to fulfil the empty spaces of the text with knowledge brought from Abreu’s previous publications which contain references of Passo da Guanxuma, weaving and redefining them.