Portrait of Brazil, a Historiographical Reading of the Essay on Brazilian Sadness

Abstract

This article aims to analyze the characteristics of the book Retrato do Brasil, written by Paulo Prado, in 1928, from the historiographical criticism. We draw the conditions of this writing, placing it in the context of social transformations of the First Republic in its last moments, also describing its particularities as possible interpretation of the nation and formation the sense of national identity.