A seductive journalist: eroticism in the narrative stories of “Mysteries of Rio”, by Benjamin Costallat

Abstract

In 1924, the Jornal do Brasil published a famous series of news stories on Rio de Janeiro’s underworld, written by one of the most popular names of the Brazilian press between 1920 and 1930: Benjamim Costallat. “Mistérios do Rio” (Mysteries of Rio), as the series was called, depicted not only crimes and opium addicted people but erotic situations. Dealing with typical expedients of fiction, those eroticized news articles are presented with a narrative format of great attraction and impact, and correspond to a phase when Brazilian journalism tried to widen its public.