The present work presents a study of self-translation based on the case of the Brazilian writer João Ubaldo Ribeiro. Using in the revisited concept of model author, this thesis seeks to analyse whether the practice of self-translation can be seen, in the case of the Brazilian writer, as the continuation of the process of original writing. The elaboration of the answer to this question is based on the analysis of the corpus, which consists of: (i) the article Suffering in translation, by João Ubaldo Ribeiro; (ii) published and unpublished interviews given by the author; (iii) original and self-translated texts produced by João Ubaldo; (iv) reviews written by North American critics and published in the USA; and (v) books written by professional readers about João Ubaldo´s works. Also, the investigation uses different research instruments: (i) the comparative analysis between original and self-translated texts; (ii) Lambert and van Gorp´s model for the analysis of translated literature; and (iii) e-mail interview. Besides the analysis of the corpus, this study presents a brief historical account of self-translation and general critical reports of self-translators´ - Vladimir Nabokov, Samuel Beckett, Milan Kundera, Catalan writers and Scottish poets - works. Rather than provide readers with a detailed critical analysis of these writers´ texts, these reports seek to make the dialogue between distinct self-translation practices possible.