SOURCE: "Popular Poetry in the Novels of Jorge Amado," in Journal of Latin American Lore, Vol. 2, No. 1, Summer, 1976, pp. 3-22.

In the following essay, Baden traces Amado's use of popular and oral verse forms in his novels.

The diverse aspects of Bahian popular culture manifest themselves as some of the most distinctive and important elements of the fiction of Jorge Amado. In effect, popular songs, stories, and customs are at the core of the underlying psychological structure of his novels. Naturally, many critics have referred to Amado's heavy borrowing from the folhetos, the popular literary press of Brazil's Northeast, as well as his extensive utilization of such aspects of popular Afro-Bahian culture as candomblé and capoeira. Little has been done, however, in the way of a systematic examination of the kinds of popular verse forms utilized, their origins, and their functions within the novels. Thus, it is my...