Between real life and creation: the correspondence as a reservoir of fiction

Abstract

The research in writers’ collections can be a useful source of information for the analysis of a literary production for they are real reservoirs of memory that keep procedural traces and life testimonies. Usually, the correspondence that the writer maintained during his life is conserved in theses archives and, when are consulted, they can supply the researcher fundamental information not only concerning one moment of the writer’s life but also on his practices of writing and the genesis of some literary works. We will show as a letter found in the archive Caio Fernando Abreu made possible a different reading of the short story “Uma estória confusa”.