“If you go, go in peace”

the echoes of greek tragedy in Bacurau

Abstract

This article seeks to Investigate how ancient narrative structures, especially those of Greek tragedies, are still perpetuated and observable In contemporary works of fiction, such as the film Bacurau, by Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles. To do this, we used Aristotle’s analysis of these structures In his Poetics as a basis, and extracted from this text the key concepts needed to define what a classical tragedy is. Based on this mapping, we briefly describe the plot of Mendonça Filho and Dornelles’ film, and then analyze how the concepts defined by Aristotle figure In this contemporary narrative.We then point out how characteristics of Greek tragedy studied by other authors, such as Friedrich Nietzsche, Francis Muecke and Marcos Cardoso Gomes, also appear In Bacurau,demonstrating how other Intertextualities are established between the two works. Finally, we analyze the ambivalent meanings arising from the relationship between the tragedies and the film. To Investigate the Intertextualities and carry out the analysis, we will use Professor Sandra Nitrini’s work Literatura Comparada (2015) as a theoretical reference, In order to delimit the concepts of tradition and Intertextuality.