A figuração da morte: um diálogo entre o Medieval, o Transitório e o Contemporâneo em As Intermitências da Morte, de José Saramago, e três diferentes formas artísticas

Abstract

The present study investigates and analyzes the existence of a medieval, transitional and contemporary phases in death’s figuration in José Saramago's novel As intermitências da morte in comparison with three different artistic forms: iconography, cinema and comics. Specifically, in our comparative approach, we used the medieval iconography in which we address some of its main historical examples. Furthermore, in cinema we used The Seventh Seal by Ingmar Bergman and, in comic books, we used Sandman by Neil Gaiman. For the study and analysis of the mentioned works, we carried out research around the studies of death, naming what we call the figuration of death, serving as a theoretical framework the reflection on death established by contemporary philosophy and anthropology, through the theories of Edgar Morin, Norbert Elias, Martin Heiddeger among others, as well as historical and iconographic aspects present in the writings of Phillipe Ariès, Johan Huizinga, Michel Vovelle, as well as other authors in other fields. Therefore, it was possible to verify that medieval figuration still resists crystallized in the novel, due to the persistence of some attitudes towards death, the way the Church acts and understands the afterlife and the image and attitudes it assumes towards death. As for transitional figuration, this exists almost in secret, notable more clearly by the pendulum movement of the novel than by the gradient in Bergman. Finally, contemporary figuration of death is the wildest, as it fades the medieval figure almost completely, as well as leaving no room for a transition in the opposite direction, that is, Contemporary → Medieval. With the concealment of death as the main cause of this, the image of death takes on almost definitive forms, with little room for evolution, being this a in-novel character death that conceals itself.