After a long period in which his work was neglected or despised by Brazilian academia, and admired principally by non-Brazilians with little knowledge of Brazil, a re-evaluation of Gilberto Freyre's ideas and style got under way during the 1990s, sorting out the incisiveness of some of his ideas from the superficial character of others, and trying to separate out facts from the myths created about him, some of which were of his own making. This article discovers the heterogeneity, if not the promiscuity of the young Freyre's reading, which may explain why he disconcerted his readers for so long, since it was hard to place a simple label on this individual who was clearly anti-racist yet also rather conservative. It also unmasks the' myth of the myth' of racial democracy - a term which Freyre never applied to Brazil except with hesitation and qualifications.
Gilberto Freyre; intellectual history of Brazil; race relations; racial democracy