Slum literary festival honors 11-year-old author

Agatha Cris shares more than her name with Agatha Christie, the world-famous British thriller and detective story author. Eleven-year-old Agatha is also a writer, and her first book, a thriller, has as its main character a detective—or rather, a detective cat that unravels mystery cases in his home Morro Chapéu Mangueira, a slum in south Rio.

O Mistério das Árvores da Rua Roberto (“The mystery of the Robert Street trees”, in a free translation) was released in June. Since then, Cris has become popular in her community and among young writers around the country. Because writing changed her life, Agatha is among the authors honored by the Slum Literature Festival (FLUPP). The girl admits she has never read any of Agatha Christie's books despite having two of her titles, but credits her literary awakening to the fact that she was encouraged to read both at home and at school. “Otherwise I wouldn't have got to know other stories and built an ability to create one of my own,” she said.

Complete with discussions, poetry readings, book launches and contests, the festival, which began Tuesday (Oct. 3), runs until Sunday (8) in the Babilônia and Chapéu Mangueira slums. Agatha Cris will be awarded the Carolina Maria de Jesus prize, named after a major Brazilian slum-dweller that achieved prominence as an author.

The event aims to promote new authors and encourage reading with diverse perspectives and experiences, and includes school activities carried out in the course of the year. Currently at its fourth edition, it is expected to draw more than 20,000 people and revive local arts and culture evening tradition.

One of the event's curators, Écio Salles, says promoting literature in the slums produced by slum residents is also a way to show that there is much more to the slums than “violence and poverty” and unlock their rich aesthetic and creative potential. “We must create opportunities for the outskirts to express themselves, not because there's more truth to their stories, but because they also have something to say, their own unique stories.”

A number of collections have been published this year through FLUPP, including three novels: O Número Um (“Number one”), by Raquel Oliveira, on the author's relationship with Naldo, a drug dealer from Favela da Rocinha; Sobre Garotos que Beijam Garotos (“About boys who kiss boys”), by Enrique Coimbra, about the inner conflicts of a young homosexual man, and Cidade de Deus Z (“City of God Z”), by Julio Pecly – a zombie story set in the west Rio community the book gets is name from.

About 50 authors from Brazil and other countries will be at the festival. One of the foreign guests is Scotland's Alan Campbell, who uses the language of games in his novels. Besides literature, the events will discuss violence, the environment, and science.

Also part of the event is the 2nd Rio Poetry Slam in six languages, featuring poets from 16 countries including Poland, South Africa and Uruguay. The audience will be the jury for the contest.

This year, FLUPP honors Nise da Silveira, the first Brazilian psychiatrist to reject such cruel patient treatment practices as shock therapy and confinement. She revolutionized psychiatry in Brazil and made important contributions to occupational therapy, a subject she covered in several books.

Translated by Mayra Borges

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