ALove practices between women are harmful, perverse, unhealthy, and lesbians need treatment so they can have a decent life. This medico-legal discourse permeated Brazilian society at least until the middle of the 20th century and justified the exclusion of these women from society, with many ending up in asylums. “These are people who lived under the stigma of perversion, that homo-eroticism is a disease associated with crime, in which people kill and die for love”, says professor Nadia Nogueira, author of a doctoral thesis aiming to revive the discussion about lesbianism in Brazil.

Inventions of the Self in Love Stories: Lota Macedo Soares and Elizabeth Bishop is the title of the work supervised by Professor Luzia Margareth Rago and was presented in December, at the Institute of Philosophy and Human Sciences (IFCH) at Unicamp. “In fact, I used the romance between these two women, who lived together for almost 20 years between the mountains of Petrópolis and Rio de Janeiro, to fuel the discussion about lesbianism. They were able to create emotional and sexual bonds outside institutional spaces such as family and motherhood. The choice of the title is due to the fact that Lota and Bishop reinvented themselves with this strong loving relationship, the first building architectural works and the second producing most of her poetic work”, explains the historian.

Lota Macedo Soares came from an elite family in Rio. He drove a Jaguar, wore jeans and shirts. She did not attend university, but took classes with illustrious artists such as the painter Cândido Portinari and became an aesthete with in-depth knowledge of architecture and urbanism. His most visible work was the Aterro do Flamengo, which caused him disagreements, especially with the landscaper Roberto Burle Marx. Elizabeth Bishop is considered the greatest North American poet of the 20th century. Her best production occurred during her years of seclusion with Lota Soares, at Casa da Samambaia in Petrópolis. There she produced Poems, which earned her the Pulitzer Prize (1956) and international recognition. For Lota, she wrote Banho de Shampu, which we reproduce on this page.

“In Brazil, Bishop freed himself from a negative past: he was an alcoholic and had problems with the lack of a family. Her father died when she was eight months old and her mother, who went into a psychotic episode after that, spent the rest of her life in psychiatric clinics”, remembers Nadia Nogueira. The writer arrived in Brazil in November 1951, escaping another crisis. Poetry consultant at the Washington Library, but deeming herself unfit for the position, she fell into depression and sought refuge in a writers' colony. “When she drank too much, she admitted herself to hospital. He thought it was time to make his dream of a circumnavigation trip around South America come true”, says the historian.

The House - It can be said that the initial reason for Bishop's stay in Brazil was the ingestion of a cashew, which caused an allergic attack, swelling and deforming his hands and face. The attention given by the Brazilians enchanted her, and even more so the declaration of love that Lota made to her. Nadia Nogueira analyzes two of the writer's short stories in her thesis. “Na Aldeia (In The Village), as the writer herself stated, 'is absolutely autobiographical'. Having lived with his maternal grandparents in a fishing village, the landscape of Petrópolis made him look back at his own childhood. Around the age of seven, she went to live with her paternal grandparents, surrounded by serious people. In the short story A Ratinha do Campo, she writes that she felt 'with the same status as the house dog'”, recalls the researcher.

Lota Macedo Soares also suffered from family problems. Emotionally worn out by her parents' separation, she decided to live alone at the age of 25, which already meant a small scandal in high society. Returning from a period in New York, she wanted to build her retreat on the mountain land received as an inheritance, in the Samambaia neighborhood, in Petrópolis. With the help of architect Sergio Bernardes, she designed the Samambaia house, a landmark of modern Brazilian architecture. “In the seven years that the works lasted, Lota and Bishop lived in inhospitable conditions, without water, under the light of lamps”, says the historian.

The landfill – Carlos Lacerda became governor of Guanabara at the end of 1960. In the name of personal friendship, Lacerda invited Lota to carry out public work. After sowing ideas, she took the governor to the window of the apartment where he lived, resolutely pointing out: “I want this.” In the area where the asphalt was laid to ease traffic between the Center and the South Zone, Lota wanted to build the largest park in the city. “The tumultuous construction process of the Aterro do Flamengo began, headed by a woman without a university degree, and under the impression of her contemporaries, she assumed the position only because of her friendship with the governor. The fight, public and notorious, would be with Burle Marx, responsible for landscaping”, says Nadia Nogueira.

To fill the area, the Santo Antonio hill was dismantled using water jets. To create Botafogo beach, sand was removed from the bottom of the sea, with the same dredger that opened the Panama Canal. “All of that was designed by Lota. She also faced Burle Marx to maintain the lighting with 45-meter-high poles, allowing night walks in the park. Another suggestion from Lota was the large number of sports courts, which are now rented every day of the year, including in the early hours of the morning, when they are taken over by teams of building doormen and taxi drivers,” she adds.

The tragic – With the defeat of Carlos Lacerda's candidate in 1965, Lota was removed from command of the work, which resulted in three months of hospitalization for sleep therapy. She also faced a defamation campaign encouraged by Burle Marx, who accused her of arrogance in her decisions. As for her relationship with Elizabeth Bishop, there was inevitable wear and tear due to the five years of construction work at the Park, with Lota working 12 to 14 hours a day. Relegated, the poet returned to alcohol and no longer produced, ending up accepting an invitation to teach a course in Seattle.

When he returned in mid-1966, Bishop already had another partner, much younger. Passed over, Lota became neurotic and transferred her obsession with work to her ex-partner, who left the scene at the doctors' request. In September 1967, Elizabeth Bishop received a visit in New York from a woman who was completely weakened, physically and mentally. “It was not the Lota I expected to meet again,” she wrote. The same night he arrived, Lota took a bottle of Valium. After a week of coma, his heart stopped. After all, did she die for love?

Codes and meeting points for lesbians in the 50s and 60s

Between December 2003 and June 2004, Nadia Nogueira interviewed around twenty women who were willing to talk about their affective and sexual practices with other women in Rio de Janeiro in the 50s and 60s. “It was no easy task to convince ladies of over 60 years of commenting on the past, but I was lucky enough to find six of them in the same place, the Alcazar restaurant, where a birthday party was taking place”, he admits. With free access to a very private world, the researcher was able to schedule new interviews to learn about the codes and map the meeting points of women at the time.

“In the 50s, these spaces were almost non-existent, as lesbians were terrified of being identified as 'woman-man', under penalty of being admitted to an asylum. In any case, bossa nova was already opening places of coexistence for an eclectic group, from prostitutes to nightlife singers”, says the teacher. The first bars, restaurants and nightclubs openly frequented by lesbians appeared in the 60s, years of transgression. “There was El Jerez, the Bistrô, the nightclub at the Hotel Vogue, and the Alcazar, which is still on Avenida Atlântica,” she adds.

Regarding codes, Nadia Nogueira observes that lesbians only had the heterosexual norm as a reference. “Many told me they didn’t know how to date another woman. They imagined that they should behave like a man. Hence, lesbians from lower social classes masculinized themselves, using their own bodies to conquer public space, they had no other means of breaking with the dominant discourse,” she states.

Elite lesbians, on the other hand, kept to themselves, preferring to organize private parties. “To be does not mean to appear”, was the expression they used. “I only detected two places that are at the intersection between public and private: Bar da Fernanda, in Tijuca, and Clube das 12, in Jacarepaguá, where on certain occasions a suit was more elegant. Even though they were wearing suits, they did not think of themselves as masculine, but as 'exotic', getting rid of the stigma,” she comments.