By José Etham de Lucena Barbosa Filho

 

It is with great honor that the Laboratory of the Anthropology of Fiction and the 1st International Congress of Iserian Studies recognize the invaluable contributions of Luiz de França Costa Lima Filho to Brazilian literary theory and criticism.

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Born in 1937 in São Luís, Maranhão, Luiz Costa Lima holds a law degree from the Federal University of Pernambuco and a doctorate in Literature from the University of São Paulo. His doctoral thesis, later published as a book, Estruturalismo e Teoria da Literatura (Structuralism and Literary Theory), marked the beginning of a lifelong dedication to understanding the literary phenomenon. Costa Lima has authored over 40 books, including major reference works in Brazilian literary criticism and theory, such as Terra Ignota, Vida e Mimesis, Mimesis e Modernidade, Mimesis: desafio ao pensamento, and O controle do imaginário e a afirmação do romance. This scholarly contributions have placed Costa Lima among the foremost names in Brazilian literature, alongside Antonio Candido, Roberto Schwarz, Silviano Santiago, and Alfredo Bosi. The sharp insight Costa Lima brought to literature, devoting himself with rigor and acumen to both European and Brazilian prose and poetry, permanently altered the paradigm of literary studies with his perspectives on mimesis, the control of the imaginary, and the theory of fiction.

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We must also highlight Costa Lima’s role in introducing Wolfgang Iser and other theorists of the Constance School to Brazil. Through his translation of seminal texts by Iser, his prefaces to books, and his guidance in the translation of new works, Luiz Costa Lima made Iser’s work more accessible to students, teachers, and researchers of literature in Brazil. If today Reception Aesthetics holds a place in Brazilian universities, Costa Lima is undoubtedly one of the main reasons for it. Such remarkable contributions cannot go unnoticed and are undoubtedly part of the reason for the existence of this congress.