This thesis proposes investigations into the relationships between the concepts of style, and the agency of objects, taking as privileged intercessors, in Gilles Deleuze s words, short narratives and fragments from the work of Machado de Assis. The choice of working with this author s short stories is due to the fact that they present guidelines and problems that, uniquely embodied in Machado s writing, allow fertile contagion with certain strands of contemporary thought. The thesis approaches, especially, the strength of the chosen short stories in order to catalyze the debates held today around the philosophical and anthropological revision of the partition between nature and culture in the West. The work of theoretical creation undertaken here seeks to relate, in this context, the topics of the life of objects (now out of the so-called inanimate world and endowed with agency) and style (a notion which, contrary to strictly textual classic definitions, is now understood as a clash of forces produced in the relations between bodies from heterogeneous domains). In connection with the theoretical work, this thesis also proposes critical revisions of certain aspects commonly attributed to Machado s fiction, such as the devaluation of the world of appearances, the centrality of eminently modern values, and pessimism. Seeking to fuel the debate, also by means of its own composition strategies, the thesis explores the possibilities of transit between the essayistic and epistolary genres.