[The] modern revolutionary in literature, and Guimarães Rosa in particular, is, in the last analysis, a classic in spite of himself. The first thing to be noted about Rosa's Grande Sertão: Veredas [The Devil to Pay in the Backlands] and his short-stories is that they belong to "universal regionalism," thus including themselves in the Brazilian literary tradition and, more particularly, in the tradition of Modernism. Regardless of any first impression we may have, Guimarães Rosa does not reject his country's literary history, and could not be a great writer if he did; his work is an effort, frequently successful, and always extremely original, to surpass and prolong that heritage by incorporating it into a different spiritual and intellectual process. I think, however, that his work would not be what it is had Modernism not occurred; Modernism opened more ways than it could itself go through...