The Virtual Book -
BE, by Alfredo Karras

[Translated from Portuguese]

I read my first ebook recently. It was the opuscule Be, by Alfredo Karras, a writer and cartoonist who lives in Cubatão. He is the first native author to contract this new form of publication to a foreign publisher. In truth, I didn't receive the work to read on a computer, but printed on paper. To read the work, I needed to put it in a plastic cover and spiral for better conservation. Text and illustrations together total 53 pages. The work is a direct descendent from the famous Jonathan Livingstone Seagull, by Richard Bach. Cubatão's disciple goes beyond the master by subsituting people for that lot of seagulls lost in metaphors and aeronautic's acrobatics expressions, deserving more of being shot than admiration. Karras's book unites idealism with appreciation of current philosophies — e.g., rationalism, determinism — and discloses a strong spiritist influence. A Kardecist's son, I always search not just the doctrinal books, but the fictional too; people charged to divulge the doctrine. Therefore, it wasn't hard for me to recognize certain signals — spiritual brotherhood, evolution of the spirits, Law of Return, forgetfulness of previous life, choice of evolution through pain or love, reincarnation with marks of the previous life — and identify the source.

The printed book and the virtual, this better than that, recalls the old Platonic myth of the cave. The person who lived in the darkness and discovered more about the projected shadows is mocked when he returns to explain his discoveries and enlighten those who continue in the darkness. The seagull who flies higher is expelled from the flock but returns to direct the seagulls of the same inclination. The knight obtains some spiritual evolution through the company and reunion with people of superior spirits and continues his pilgrimage seeking to enlighten the people he comes across, suffering painful consequences. The difference consists in the fact that Bach's work is just a mere volume of sub-literature, while with Karras's book, such are the united links and expression of ideas, that this can be a good introduction to meditation for teenagers, if they are so inclined. It is obvious that is not suffice to just read the work; it will be necessary to dissect its content — from there the progress of the reader.

- Ricardo de Mattos

This article was published by Digestivo Cultural on 26 August 2004 and appears courtesy of Digestivo Cultural