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Castro Alves Biography & Facts

Antônio Frederico de Castro Alves (14 March 1847 – 6 July 1871) was a Brazilian poet and playwright famous for his abolitionist and republican poems. One of the most famous poets of the Condorist movement, he wrote classics such as Espumas Flutuantes and Hinos do Equador, which elevated him to the position of greatest among his contemporaries, as well as verses from poems such as "Os Escravos" and "A Cachoeira de Paulo Afonso", in addition to the play Gonzaga, which earned him epithets such as "O Poeta dos Escravos" (The Poet of the Slaves) and "republican poet" by Machado de Assis, or descriptions of being "a national poet, if not more, nationalist, social, human and humanitarian poet", in the words of Joaquim Nabuco, of being "the greatest Brazilian poet, lyric and epic", in the words of Afrânio Peixoto, or even of being the "walking apostle of Condorism" and "a volcanic talent, the most enraptured of all Brazilian poets", in the words of José Marques da Cruz. He was part of the romantic movement, being part of what scholars call the "third romantic generation" in Brazil. Alves began his major production at the age of sixteen, beginning his verses for "Os Escravos" at seventeen (1865), with wide dissemination in the country, where they were published in newspapers and recited, helping to form the generation that would come to achieve the abolition of slavery in the country. Alongside Luís Gama, Nabuco, Ruy Barbosa and José do Patrocínio, he stood out in the abolitionist campaign, "in particular, the figure of the great poet from Bahia Castro Alves". José de Alencar said of him, when he was still alive, that "the powerful feeling of nationality throbs in his work, that soul that makes great poets, like great citizens". His greatest influences were the romantic writers Victor Hugo, Lord Byron, Lamartine, Alfred de Musset and Heinrich Heine. Historian Armando Souto Maior said that the poet, "as Soares Amora points out 'on the one hand marks the arrival point of romantic poetry, on the other hand he already announces, in some poetic processes, in certain images, in political and social ideas, Realism'. Nevertheless, Alves must be considered the greatest Brazilian romantic poet; his social poetry against slavery galvanized the sensibilities of the time". Manuel Bandeira said that "the only and authentic condor in these bombastic Andes of Brazilian poetry was Castro Alves, a truly sublime child, whose glory is invigorated today by the social intention he put into his work". In the words of Archimimo Ornelas, "we have Castro Alves, the revolutionary; Castro Alves, the abolitionist; Castro Alves, the republican; Castro Alves, the artist; Castro Alves, the landscaper of American nature; Castro Alves, the poet of youth; Castro Alves, universal poet; Castro Alves, the seer; Castro Alves, the national poet par excellence; finally, in all human manifestations we can find that revolutionary force that was Castro Alves" and, above all, "Castro Alves as the man who loved and was loved". Early life The son of physician Antônio José Alves and Clélia Brasília da Silva Castro, Antônio Frederico de Castro Alves was born in the Cabaceiras farm, at ten o'clock in the morning, on Sunday, 14 March 1847. The poet had the family nickname of "Cecéu". He spent his early childhood in Bahia's hinterlands, which made him "keep an indelible impression" for the rest of his life, in the words of Afrânio Peixoto. He was cared for by the maid Leopoldina, who told him the stories and legends of the sertão, and her son Gregório would become Alves' page. He attended primary school in São Félix. Together with his older brother, he had his initial classes with a teacher and healer named José Peixoto da Silva, and Aristides Mílton remembers that he was a colleague of both in the city of Cachoeira in the class of the schoolmaster Antônio Frederico Loup. He kept his first childhood love, Leonídia Fraga, from the period, in the words of Archimimo Ornelas: "he had met her as a child, in Curralinho, when they both played in the meadows". Ornelas attributes the poet's verses to this memory: "When childhood flowed happily, aimlessly (...) In my childhood yours was reflected / I kissed your soft, tiny hands. / You had a flutter of divine wings... / You were — the Angel of Faith!…”; he would meet her again twice. In 1854, when the family moved to the province's capital, they initially went to live in a sobrado where Júlia Fetal, a victim of a crime of passion, had lived. Fetal was murdered by her fiancé in 1848 at the age of twenty. The boy Antônio Frederico had heard there stories of the ghosts that lived in the residence. Adelaide, who would become the poet's favorite sister, was born there. The residence was at Rua do Rosário, No. 1, but in the following year they moved again to Rua do Paço, No. 47. Castro Alves studied at Colégio Sebrão at this time. He remained at this school for two years. In 1858, along with his brothers, Alves went to the Ginásio Baiano, owned by the famous educator Abílio César Borges, the Baron of Macaúbas. There, he found a fertile cultural environment, in Peixoto's record: "...a literary atmosphere, produced by the 'oiteiros', or soirées, then in fashion, art parties, music, poetry, recitation of verses and speeches, which would seduce him" and that this made him reveal his talent very early: "our poet revealed himself, perhaps before the age of thirteen, at that age for sure, from which the first preserved compositions date". In fact, the years 1859 to 1861 are the dates of his first verses. Desembargador Souza Pitanga, in a lecture given in Rio de Janeiro in 1918, remembering his colleague Plínio de Lima, recorded the atmosphere at Ginásio Baiano: "...this gentle and hospitable manor of beautiful letters, where a cheerful and vivacious legion of aspirants to future was going to receive the eucharistic bread of knowledge from the lips of a plethora of teaching priests". There, according to him, was "a shady grove of leafy mango trees, where cicadas sang in chorus" and "the late Director Dr. Abílio César Borges, dominating with his erect bearing and noble manners, a legion of minors who were made up of young men of 18 years old to even 7 years old children". Pitanga recalled that, among the professors, Ernesto Carneiro Ribeiro, Eduardo Frederico Alexander and Antônio Damásio stood out; among the contemporary students were Aristides Milton, Antônio Alves de Carvalhal, Odorico Mendes, Ruy Barbosa and the three Castro Alves brothers. The death of Castro Alves' mother in 1859 was the beginning of the family's losses. Clélia Brasília was "victimized by lung weakness" and did not resist. Taken by violent commotion and revealing the beginning of emotional problems, his brother José Antônio then threatened to commit suicide, trying to throw himself out of a window. In 1861, while still a student at Colégio Baiano, he published verses in several newspapers in honor of the "master of the .... Discover the Castro Alves popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Castro Alves books.