A inserção do conto A escrava, de Maria Firmina dos Reis, nos debates sobre a abolição no Maranhão e a luta dos escravizados pela sua liberdade

The aim of this article is to place the short story A escrava (1887), by Maria Firmina dos Reis, in the public discussions about slavery and abolition in Brazil. Based on this bibliographical survey, which includes her work for various newspapers in Maranhão, the state in which she was born, we have gathered elements that enable us to analyze how the author represents the (enslaved) black person as a political subject with her own voice, through which she expressed her memory, subjectivity and affectivity in the context of enslaved motherhood. In this way, we can see how Maria Firmina dos Reis intervened in the daily life of her time through literature. The examination of her writings allows for the re-signification of black history, but this time by a woman, a writer and an Afro- Brazilian, not to mention that this reopens the discussion about the inclusion or exclusion of her production in national literary and historiographical criticism.