Sobre o futuro no passado e no presente

Abstract

This paper discusses changes and textual variations of usage in future reference in Portuguese. Future tense in Portuguese can be expressed in five different ways: two simple forms and three periphrastic forms and this variation seems to be rooted in developments that took place earlier in Latin. Habere was used to express futurity when it is followed the main verb (amare habeo) and this use – for its turn – gave origin to the morphological simple future (amar(e) ha(b)e(o) > amarei,  haver being reanalyzed as a temporal morpheme. Our main focus here is to discuss the written production of the Brazilian “Cristiano Otoni” in different types of texts, family letters and editorials (letters from editors) from the 19th century, based on the assumption that textual genre – in  personal or public sphere – would (or would not) be responsible to explain the multiple variable expressions – and at what level – of the future. We come to the conclusion that the morphological simple future and the periphrasis with haver de (haver de + infinitive) are predominant, regardless of the different social roles (private and public figure) assumed by the same writer. Textual genre (personal letters and letters from editors) cannot be seen as the main constraint, to some extent, related to the covariation in the expression of the future in 19^th century Brazilian Portuguese.