''A Gloriosa Família'' is a novel by the

Angola , national_anthem = " Angola Avante"() , image_map = , map_caption = , capital = Luanda , religion = , religion_year = 2020 , religion_ref = , coordina ...

n author

Pepetela Artur Carlos Maurício Pestana dos Santos (born 1941) is a major Angolan writer of fiction. He writes under the name Pepetela. A Portuguese Angolan, Pepetela was born in Benguela, Portuguese Angola, and fought as a member of the MPLA in the long g ...

published in 1997 by Dom Quixote (Lisbon). The novel deals with the family of Baltasar Van Dum, a

Flemish Flemish (''Vlaams'') is a Low Franconian dialect cluster of the Dutch language. It is sometimes referred to as Flemish Dutch (), Belgian Dutch ( ), or Southern Dutch (). Flemish is native to Flanders, a historical region in northern Belgium; ...

slave trader in Luanda, during the period of time that the Dutch ruled the colony. In order to write the novel, Pepetela undertook painstaking research of the seven years in which the

Dutch Dutch commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands * Dutch people () * Dutch language () Dutch may also refer to: Places * Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States * Pennsylvania Dutch Country People E ...

occupied Angola, using archives located in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...

Antwerp Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504,

, and the Vatican.

Plot synopsis

The long novel is composed of 12 chapters, and is set between the years 1642 and 1648. The novel is narrated by a mute

mestiço Mestiço is a Portuguese term that referred to persons born from a couple in which one was an aboriginal person and the other a European. Mestiço community in Brazil in Colonial Brazil, it was initially used to refer to , persons born from ...

slave, who is one of Van Dum's favorites. In addition to Van Dum and the slave narrator there are many other characters in the novel, most of who are Van Dum's children. A division exists between the legitimate children that Van Dum has had with his legal wife, Dona Inocência, an African princess, and the "filhos do quintal," or the children of the yard, illegitimate children that Van Dum has had with other slaves.

Historical background

The novel takes place during the Dutch occupation of Angola. The Van Dum family of the novel can be seen as having strong parallels to the Van Dúnem family, considered the most eminent of

Luanda Luanda () is the capital and largest city in Angola. It is Angola's primary port, and its major industrial, cultural and urban centre. Located on Angola's northern Atlantic coast, Luanda is Angola's administrative centre, its chief seaport ...

Creole families.

Reception and Criticism

Many critics look at ''A gloriosa família'' as both a celebration and a criticism of Angola's creole population. Fernando Arenas wrote of the ways that novel puts a postmodern spin on the theories of Brazilian anthropologist

Gilberto Freyre Gilberto de Mello Freyre (March 15, 1900 – July 18, 1987) was a Brazilian sociologist, anthropologist, historian, writer, painter, journalist, congressman born in Recife, Pernambuco, Northeast Brazil. He is commonly associated with other m ...

, eventually critiquing the slave-holding system that is the root of Angolan society. Stephen Henighan describes the novel as illustrating both the "admirable and reprehensible sides of Creole culture." While the family is resourceful and inclusive of other races, they are all also responsible for the slave trade in the interior of the country.Henighan, p. 3

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gloriosa Familia, A Angolan novels Historical novels 1997 novels Novels set in the 1640s Novels about slavery Novels set in Angola Books by Pepetela