The enormity of a booklet: first edition and target audience of Thomas Davatz’s (1858) first edition of The colonists in St. Paulo province, Brazil

Abstract

The Sharecroppers’ Riot (1856-1857), which took place at Ibicaba farm, is one of the best-known episodes in the history of immigration to Brazil. Beyond its intrinsic relevance, the
abundance of sources facilitated and attracted historiographical investigations about the event, particularly the account written by its leader, the schoolmaster Thomas Davatz, who published a book in 1858 with the revised version of his report on the living and working conditions
in the farms of São Paulo. This article investigates the history of the writing of that book and the materiality of its first edition, published by Leonhard Hitz, in Chur, Switzerland. The titles
published by Hitz and listed in the backcover of Thomas Davatz’s book give us an overview of his target audience. Based on a bibliographical survey on a sample of such books, this paper estimates the cost of Davatz’s brochure in two francs. This estimate and the materiality of the book indicate the low-cost nature of the edition, although the price was non-negligible for the poorest parcel of the population – precisely those interested in emigrating –, corresponding to
ca. 10.5 hours of an average Swiss laborer in the 1850s. Finally, by studying its cover, the text raises some hypotheses regarding the editorial decisions made in the first translation into Portuguese by Sérgio Buarque de Holanda for the Biblioteca Histórica Brasileira, a collection organized by Rubens Borba de Moraes. The Brazilian translation is much aligned with the
original cover title, which, to a certain extent, differs from that in the coversheet.