Jorge Amado and his comrades in the international communist circle

MARCELO RIDENTI

Title

Jorge Amado and his comrades in the international communist circle

Abstract

The article seeks to elucidate aspects of the relationship of Latin American artists with the French Communist press and the international communist movement in the context of the Cold War. The overseas contacts were crucial for the international insertion of Latin Americans, as well as for their intellectual and political education. The French Communist press has been important to promote the work of Latin American artists, especially those who lived in Paris. Some of them managed to get a place in the communist network.  The Chilean poet Pablo Neruda and the Brazilian novelist Jorge Amado played a relevant role in the movement for world peace in the late 1940s and the 1950s. Amado has been the main Brazilian artist to benefit from the internationalization, also paving the way for the dissemination of works of his foreign friends in Brazil and Brazilians abroad. The article analyses also the dilemmas faced by communist artists: persecution and rewards in the heyday of Stalinism.