The first book-length edited collection on Machado de Assis, this volume offers essays on Machado de Assis' work that offer new critical perspectives not only Brazilian literature and history, but also to social, cultural, and political phenomena that continue to have global repercussions.

Foreword: Machado de Assis: the Brazilian Master Then and Now Nelson H. Vieira.-  Introduction: Lamonte Aidoo and Daniel F. Silva.- Part I: Situating Machado de Assis in History, Literature, and Philosophy.- 1 Machado de Assis: Creator and Character in a Troubled Scene Lilia Moritz Schwarcz.- 2  Machado de Assis and Realism: A Literary Genealogy Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht.- 3 Machado de Assis and Pascal Pedro Meira Monteiro.- Part II: Machado on Race, Identity, and Society.- 4 Machado de Assis: From “Tragic Mulatto” to Human Tragicomedy G. Reginald Daniel.- 5 “Father Versus Mother”: Slavery and its Apparatuses Fernando Rocha.- 6 The “Chinese Question” in Machado’s Journalism  Sonia Roncador.- Part III: Women in Machado’s Work.- 7 Writing Womanhood in the New Brazil: Machado’s Lição de Botânica Earl E. Fitz.- 8 Curiosity: Undecidability and Gender in Dom Casmurro Marta Peixoto.- Part IV: Machado on Masculinity and Queer Relations.- 9 Machado’s Wounded Males Luiz Fernando Valente.- 10 Homoaffectivity Exemplified in Dom Casmurro Camilo Gomides.- 11 Masculinity and Matrimonial Secrets in Dom Casmurro Richard Miskolci.- Part V: Machado, Allegory, and the Narration of Violence.- 12 Machado’s Tales of the Fantastic: Allegory and the Macabre M. Elizabeth Ginway.- 13 Machado de Assis and the Secret Heart of Literature Paulo Moreira.- 14 Framing Violence: Narrator and Reader in “Father versus Mother” Giulia Ricco. 

This book brings forth new critical perspectives from some of the most notable scholars in Brazilian literature and history on one of the great writers and cultural minds of nineteenth-century Latin America. Machado de Assis’s innovative writing style and impactful works in literature, theater, and journalism, has left an indelible mark on the letters of Brazil, Latin America, and the world, influencing innumerable writers and cultural talents of his generation and those that followed including Gabriel García Márquez, Carlos Fuentes, Susan Sontag, Woody Allen, and José Saramago. Emerging Dialogues on Machado de Assis elicits new critical perspectives on topics as diverse as national identity, slavery, modernity, politics, skepticism, genre, race, and gender. Through and examination of Machado de Assis’s life and work this volume provides an important glimpse not only into Brazil’s past, also to social, cultural, and political phenomena that continue to have global repercussions.