Por que ser Anti-Semita? : Um Inquérito entre Intelectuais Brasileiros [“Why be an Anti-Semite? An Investigation among Brazilian Intellectuals.”]

(ANTISEMITICA).

Civilização Brasileira

Rio de Janeiro

1933

This book might well be a contender in the contest for "worst title ever! " Despite the title, the volume discusses why NOT to be anti-Semitic, and includes thoughts on the matter by many of the most important Brazilian intellectuals of the day: Afranio Peixoto, Affonso Schmidt, Coelho Neto, Gilberto Amado, Menotti del Picchia, Orígenes Lessa, and even Plínio Barreto, a novelist who later became leader of the pro-Axis party in Brazil. All are here responding to the "new German leadership," seeking to examine its philosophical underpinnings and relevance for Brazil. The work is a snapshot in real time of an intellectual culture trying to come to terms with the unprecedented phenomenon of Government orchestrated anti-Semitism, whose full horrors had not yet been revealed, but whose abnormality was immediately felt. See Jeffrey Lesser, Welcoming the Undesirables: Brazil and the Jewish Question (1995).