Tereza Batista

The orphan girl Tereza is sold by her aunt Felipa to one Justiniano Duarte da Rosa, Captain Justo, on whose ranch she is treated like just another piece of property, even from a sexual point of view. But Tereza will fight to the end against the dominations to which she is subjected.
When the Captain catches her in bed with her lover Daniel, Tereza is forced to defend herself against his violence with a knife and ends up in jail. She is soon freed by Emiliano Guedes, a rich plant owner and long-time admirer. Tereza is sent to a convent, but is encouraged to escape by the panderess Gabi. Emiliano intervenes once again and takes the girl from the brothel. Left now to herself and to fate, she heads for Sergipe, where more misadventures await her: she falls for Januário Gereba, a married man, and has to fight an outbreak of smallpox alongside the prostitutes of the small town of Buquim, where she helps those assailed by the “Black bladder”. She then moves to Salvador, where she leads a movement of prostitutes, the so-called “closed legs strike”.
“Peppered with pestilence, hunger and war, death and love, Tereza Batista’s life is the stuff of cordel”, reads the epigraph. There is no shortage of trials and tribulations in this heroine’s tale, but she faces them all with unshakeable determination. And the end of the story sees the rekindling of a flicker of hope that not even exhaustion can douse.
Her spirit of non-conformism, struggle and seduction (though also her refusal of sensuality) ensure Tereza Batista her place among the great characters of Jorge Amado’s fiction.

Afterword by Lygia Fagundes Telles

Romance