For me it’s gotta be “Morte e Vida Severina”/ “Severino Death and Life”. It’s an epic poem narrating the journey of a poor man from Northeastern Brazil, a famously poor and segregated region that’s frequently affected by severe droughts, fleeing from his home and walking to the big city to survive the season. On the way he describes all the misery he experiences and sees.

One stanza that has stuck with me for years goes something like this "And all of us Severinos/With the same lives/Will die of the same/Severe Severino death,/The death died of/Old age before thirty/Of an ambush before twenty/And of hunger day by day/(Of weakness and plague/The Severino death/attacks at all ages/even those not born)

  • DharaniDharan2099@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    Ponniyin Selvan by Kalki Krishnamurthy. It’s a Tamil language historical novel written in the 1950s.

    The storyline, characters and the metaphors used to describe them were beautiful. I wish it should be read by a larger audience worldwide.