{"id":576092,"date":"2026-01-27T17:35:49","date_gmt":"2026-01-27T20:35:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/?p=576092"},"modified":"2026-01-27T17:35:49","modified_gmt":"2026-01-27T20:35:49","slug":"journey-taken-by-publishers-offers-insight-into-the-history-of-the-book-market-in-brazil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/journey-taken-by-publishers-offers-insight-into-the-history-of-the-book-market-in-brazil\/","title":{"rendered":"Journey taken by publishers offers insight into the history of the book market in Brazil"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cWhy did the victims get a scarab before dying? How is the killer finally unmasked? And who will be the hero? Pretty far out getting to dig into this mystery, huh?\u201d Decked out in 1970s slang and hippie garb, a cartoon figure chatted with readers from the back covers of Editora \u00c1tica\u2019s biggest bestsellers. The mascot embodied both the editorial intuition and the command of literary theory that defined Jiro Takahashi, the creator of the Vaga-lume<\/em> series\u2014which sold at least 120,000 copies with every new title. \u201cIn 1973 he was just 26, yet he already knew how to spot what readers wanted and bring to editing the literary knowledge he\u2019d gained as a teacher,\u201d says Thiago Mio Salla, a professor in the Publishing Department at the School of Communications and Arts, University of S\u00e3o Paulo (ECA-USP).<\/p>\n

Salla coauthored the book Jiro Takahashi<\/em> with independent researcher Ana Claudia Almeida; the book was published this year by Com-Arte and Edusp. Part of the Editando o Editor<\/em> series, the volume presents Takahashi\u2019s first-person account of nearly six decades in Brazilian publishing. \u201cHis story sheds light on the inner workings of Brazil\u2019s publishing market,\u201d Salla says. Born in 1947 in Duartina, S\u00e3o Paulo, Takahashi moved to the state capital in the 1960s and entered publishing in 1966 as a typist at the newly founded Editora \u00c1tica\u2014a publishing house he would help turn into an industry powerhouse. Over his career he also worked at other major Brazilian publishers, including Nova Fronteira, Rocco, and Global. He later ventured into independent publishing, founding Esta\u00e7\u00e3o Liberdade in 1990 with Maria Ant\u00f4nia Lobo. Six years later he stepped away from the company, which continues to operate today under different owners. \u201cBut as he writes in the book, if he\u2019s remembered for any one achievement, it will almost certainly be his work at \u00c1tica,\u201d Salla notes.<\/p>\n

According to Takahashi, the Vaga-lume<\/em> series was created against the backdrop of Brazil\u2019s 1971 Law No. 5,692, an education reform introduced during the military dictatorship (1964\u20131985). The new rules encouraged teachers to prioritize literature by Brazilian authors. The reform also made middle school\u2014today\u2019s lower secondary level\u2014mandatory in public schools. Takahashi experienced these developments up close. While working at \u00c1tica, he also taught Portuguese at the National Service for Industrial Training (SENAI), starting in 1970. \u201cStudents started asking for different kinds of reading. They weren\u2019t engaged by books like Iracema<\/em> (1865) or The Little Brunette<\/em> (1844), and began exploring other authors. No longer were they interested in books like Cazuza<\/em> (1938), by Viriato Correia [1884\u20131967]. In 1969, they discovered O g\u00eanio do crime<\/em> (The genius of crime), by Jo\u00e3o Carlos Marinho [1935\u20132019]\u2014a runaway hit. Most teachers avoided recommending it because it might not be politically correct. And maybe that was exactly why kids loved it. That set off a lightbulb for us at \u00c1tica,\u201d he recalls in the book.<\/p>\n

The Vaga-lume<\/em> series launched in 1973 with A ilha perdida<\/em> (Lost island), written by Maria Jos\u00e9 Dupr\u00e9 (1898\u20131984). In its early years, Takahashi scouted additional authors for the series, recommending revisions to their manuscripts when needed. A case in point was O escaravelho do diabo <\/em>(The devil’s scarab), published the following year. Authored by L\u00facia Machado de Almeida (1910\u20132005), the detective novel had originally appeared as a serialized story in the magazine O Cruzeiro<\/em> during the 1950s. In the original version, characters spoke using the literary pluperfect. At Takahashi\u2019s suggestion, the author agreed to update the dialogue to a more contemporary, colloquial style. \u201cTo me, that\u2019s what an editor\u2019s job is about: if you\u2019re not talking with your authors and with your readers, you can\u2019t refine the work,\u201d Takahashi says.<\/p>\n

In 1978, taking up a suggestion from writer Affonso Romano de Sant\u2019Anna (1937\u20132025), Takahashi launched what became another major hit: the Para gostar de ler<\/em> series. Aimed at middle-grade students, the anthology began as a collection of short stories by four writers already familiar to students through Brazil\u2019s textbooks: Carlos Drummond de Andrade (1902\u20131987), Fernando Sabino (1923\u20132004), Paulo Mendes Campos (1922\u20131991), and Rubem Braga (1913\u20131990). In its first six months, the series sold 200,000 copies.<\/p>\n

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Jorge Zahar archive | Reproduced<\/span>Covers from several titles published by Zahar Editores. In the photo, from left, brothers Jorge and Ernesto Zahar (both in white<\/em>) with bookseller Newton Feitosa inside the stockroom at the Ler bookstore in the 1940sJorge Zahar archive | Reproduced<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

Takahashi also developed the Nosso Tempo<\/em> collection, targeted at high-school and university readers. The collection debuted in 1974 with O pirot\u00e9cnico Zacarias<\/em> (Zacarias the pyrotechnician), by Murilo Rubi\u00e3o (1916\u20131991). Rubi\u00e3o was recommended to Takahashi by three scholars from USP\u2019s School of Philosophy, Languages and Literature, and Human Sciences: the literary critics Antonio Candido (1918\u20132017), Davi Arrigucci Jr., and then-graduate student Jorge Schwartz, whose master\u2019s thesis explored Rubi\u00e3o\u2019s fiction. Rubi\u00e3o would soon be joined by other major figures, including Clarice Lispector (1920\u20131977), who published A legi\u00e3o estrangeira<\/em> (The foreign legion; 1977) under the imprint.<\/p>\n

In August, Takahashi returned to FFLCH-USP for the event \u201cCentenary of Marcos Rey: The Legacy of the Vaga-lume<\/em> Series.\u201d Rey (1925\u20131999), a major name in Brazilian young-adult fiction, eventually became a close friend of Takahashi. \u201cI still have a sizable collection of our correspondence in my personal files,\u201d Takahashi relates in the book. But many documents from \u00c1tica\u2019s archives were lost after the company was sold in 1999. Not even editor Paulo Verano\u2014who relaunched the Vaga-lume<\/em> series in 2014 under \u00c1tica Scipione\u2014was able to recover those historical records.<\/p>\n

Precisely because there are so few surviving records of Brazil\u2019s publishing history, it was surprising to encounter the substantial archive of Jorge Zahar (1920\u20131998), who, along with his brothers Ernesto and Lucien, founded Zahar Editores in Rio de Janeiro in 1956. The archive contains 2,771 items, including letters, catalogs, and editorial reports on submitted manuscripts. When journalist Marco Aur\u00e9lio Fiochi, an alumnus of ECA-USP, learned that the family had donated the archive in 2020 to the Funda\u00e7\u00e3o Getulio Vargas Center for Research and Documentation of Contemporary Brazilian History (FGV CPDOC) in Rio de Janeiro, he decided to pore through the materials.<\/p>\n

In his doctoral dissertation, defended at FGV CPDOC in 2025, Fiochi examined the editor\u2019s correspondence with prominent figures, including sociologist and former president Fernando Henrique Cardoso and philologist Ant\u00f4nio Houaiss (1915\u20131999). His analysis was compiled into the book Os pap\u00e9is do editor<\/em> \u2013 Conversas sobre livros e amizade nas cartas do arquivo de Jorge Zahar<\/em> (The editor\u2019s papers: Conversations on books and friendship in letters from the Jorge Zahar archive; independently published, 2025). \u201cZahar used to make copies of his outgoing letters before sending them, and he kept those copies at the publishing house,\u201d Fiochi says, noting that the documents span from the 1950s until Zahar\u2019s death in 1998.<\/p>\n

Zahar also preserved internal documents, such as the launch memo for Sociology: The science of society<\/em>, authored by Rutgers University professors Jay Rumney (1905\u20131957) and Joseph Maier (1911\u20132002). Published in 1957, the volume was the company\u2019s first release. In that memo, Zahar outlined the publisher\u2019s mission: to produce translations of academic works that combined methodological rigor with language accessible to lay readers. To meet that goal, he reserved the right to modify original titles. \u201cHe often added words like \u2018manual\u2019 or \u2018dictionary\u2019 to signal that these were broad-interest reference works,\u201d says Fiochi.<\/p>\n

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Reproduced<\/span>Clockwise: titles from the Difel collections Hist\u00f3ria geral da civiliza\u00e7\u00e3o brasileira<\/em>, Corpo e alma do Brasil<\/em>, and Saber atual<\/em>Reproduced<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

Zahar\u2019s knack for anticipating what intellectuals wanted to read stemmed from his years as a bookseller. He started out importing books in 1940 and, in 1946, became co-owner\u2014with his brothers\u2014of the bookstore Ler. Located near the National School of Philosophy\u2014the precursor to the present-day Institute of Philosophy and Social Sciences at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro\u2014the downtown shop drew a steady stream of university readers. \u201cAt the time, most social science books were imported. That began to change in the 1950s under president Juscelino Kubitschek (1902\u20131976), who pushed for broad-based industrial development in Brazil. The founding of Zahar must be understood within this context of Brazil\u2019s modernization,\u201d says Fiochi.<\/p>\n

Though Zahar initially focused on translations, by the late 1960s they began publishing Brazilian authors as well. Among the titles published in this period was the first book by economist Maria da Concei\u00e7\u00e3o Tavares (1930\u20132024), Da substitui\u00e7\u00e3o de importa\u00e7\u00f5es ao capitalismo financeiro<\/em> (From import-substitution policies to financial capitalism; 1972). Zahar often remarked that \u201can editor is defined by his catalog,\u201d and that he prized coherence in his publishing choices. \u201cThe correspondence in the archive reveals his wide social network within academic circles. Those exchanges helped him assemble an impressive body of scholarly works for Brazilian universities,\u201d Fiochi notes.<\/p>\n

Zahar was not the only publisher shaping the academic publishing landscape at the time, notes historian Fabiana Marchetti. \u201cAlongside Zahar, publishers like Civiliza\u00e7\u00e3o Brasileira\u2014founded in 1929 in Rio de Janeiro and later transformed in the late 1950s under \u00canio Silveira (1925\u20131996)\u2014and S\u00e3o Paulo\u2019s Difel, directed by the French engineer Paul Monteil (1907\u20131973), were producing reference works that helped educate generations of intellectuals,\u201d says Marchetti, who completed her 2023 doctoral dissertation \u201cLivraria Francesa e Difel: Economia do livro, sociabilidade liter\u00e1ria e pensamento universit\u00e1rio em S\u00e3o Paulo (Livraria Francesa and Difel: The book economy, literary networking, and academic thought in S\u00e3o Paulo; 1947\u20131982)\u201d at FFLCH-USP. With grant funding from FAPESP, her dissertation won the History category of the 2024 CAPES Award, presented by Brazil\u2019s Federal Agency for Support and Evaluation of Graduate Education (CAPES).<\/p>\n

Marchetti\u2019s research traces the history of the two companies Monteil founded in S\u00e3o Paulo. One of them, Livraria Francesa, opened in 1947 in downtown S\u00e3o Paulo as a partnership between Monteil and his wife, Juliette Monteil (1908\u20131997). Two years later, the shop relocated to Bar\u00e3o de Itapetininga Street\u2014also in the city center\u2014where it specialized in books by French authors, particularly in the humanities and in French-language instruction. In 1951, Monteil founded the publishing house Difel\u2014short for Difus\u00e3o Europeia de Livros (European Book Distribution). \u201cAt first, the goal was to publish translations of French books coming through Portugal, acting as the Brazilian representative of the publishing house Bertrand. The venture, which started as a partnership between the Monteils and French booksellers Marcel Didier and Georges Lucas, had support from France\u2019s Ministry of Foreign Affairs,\u201d Marchetti explains. \u201cBut before long, Monteil launched a publishing program that paired Brazilian-made translations with curated works by Brazilian scholars.\u201d<\/p>\n

Among Difel\u2019s major collections were Corpo e alma do Brasil<\/em> (The body and soul of Brazil; 1957) and Hist\u00f3ria geral da civiliza\u00e7\u00e3o brasileira<\/em> (A general history of Brazilian civilization; 1960). The first, created as an outlet for S\u00e3o Paulo\u2019s expanding academic output, was directed by Fernando Henrique Cardoso beginning in 1960. The second collection\u2014initially directed by historian S\u00e9rgio Buarque de Holanda (1902\u20131982)\u2014was modeled on the French Histoire g\u00e9n\u00e9rale des civilisations<\/em>, published by Presses Universitaires de France (PUF). \u201cCorpo e alma do Brasil <\/em>established Difel as a publisher aligned with intellectual currents critical of the military dictatorship,\u201d says Marchetti.<\/p>\n

In the DOPS archives\u2014the files of Brazil\u2019s former political police\u2014Marchetti located Monteil\u2019s dossier. He had been active in the Communist Party\u2019s underground network in the 1940s and stayed close to the group for decades afterward. \u201cMonteil went into hiding for a time after the 1964 military coup, yet Difel\u2019s publishing profile stayed consistent up until his death in 1973,\u201d she says. Three years later, the company was sold to Civiliza\u00e7\u00e3o Brasileira, which itself was acquired by Record in 1982. Livraria Francesa stayed at the same address for seventy years. In 2021, it relocated to a smaller storefront in S\u00e3o Paulo\u2019s Moema district. Today, the bookstore operates exclusively online.<\/p>\n

The story above was published with the title “Paper trails<\/strong>” in issue 356 of October\/2025.<\/p>\n

Project<\/strong>
\nPaul Monteil and Difel: Publishing and dissemination of Brazilian academic thought (1947\u20131982) (n\u00b0 17\/20206-3<\/a>); Grant Mechanism<\/strong> Doctoral Fellowship; Supervisor<\/strong> Marisa Midore Deaecto (USP); Beneficiary<\/strong> Fabiana Marchetti; Investment<\/strong> R$158,979.77.<\/p>\n

Books<\/strong>
\nFIOCHI, Marco Aur\u00e9lio. Os pap\u00e9is do editor: Conversas sobre livros e amizade nas cartas do arquivo de Jorge Zahar<\/strong>. Rio de Janeiro: Edi\u00e7\u00e3o independente, 2025.
\nSALLA, T. M. & ALMEIDA, A. C. Editando o editor: Jiro Takahashi<\/strong>. S\u00e3o Paulo: Com-Arte Editora Laborat\u00f3rio \/ Edusp, 2025.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jiro Takahashi, Jorge Zahar, and Paul Monteil helped transform the reading habits of several generations of Brazilians","protected":false},"author":793,"featured_media":576093,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[165],"tags":[241,245],"coauthors":[5687],"class_list":["post-576092","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-humanities","tag-history","tag-literature"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576092","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/793"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=576092"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576092\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":576105,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576092\/revisions\/576105"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/576093"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=576092"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=576092"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=576092"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=576092"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}