The theatrical literature of Brazil is poor; the origin of the modern drama is generally attributed to Magalhães’ tragedy upon Antonio José, 1838, and to the comedies of Luis Carlos Martins Penna (1815-1848). Of drama there is no lack; all that is needed is the dramatist. Martins Penna stands out easily from the ruck for elementary realism, but he is almost alone. Even today, the plays of Claudio de Souza, for all their success upon the stage, cannot compare with the quality that may be encountered in contemporary poetry, novels and tales.
The Romantic period in Brazil is distinguished as much for activity as for actual accomplishment; historically it is of prime importance in the national development, while esthetically it reveals a certain broadening of interests. The national writer, as a type, has attained his majority; he gazes upon broader horizons. Yet take away Guarany, Iracema, Innocencia, O Moço Louro, Moreninha, and what, really, is left in prose? The poets fare better; they are nearer to the sentient heart of things. Yet implacable esthetic criteria would do away with much of their product as well. It is by such tokens as these that one may recognize the secondary importance of the national letters, for, of course, Brazilian letters do not constitute a major literature. Here it is the salient individual that counts, and I, for one, am inclined to think that in art such an individual, as bodied forth in his work, is the only thing that counts. The rest—genres, evolution, periods,—is important in the annals of national development; it is, however, sociology, history, what you will, but not the primary concern of art.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] “True Romanticism,” says Wolf, “is nothing other than the expression of a nation’s genius unrestrained by the trammels of convention.” He would derive the name through the same reasoning that called the lingua romana rustica (country Roman speech) Romance, as in the phrase Romance Languages, in opposition to the learned Latin known as the sermo urbanus, or language of the city. Such liberation as Wolf points out, was the work of German criticism. “The Germans avenged themselves for the double servitude, political and literary, with which the French had so long oppressed them, by at last delivering the people from the pseudo-classic fetters.” A service they performed a half-century later, as we have suggested, bringing a new breath to the later pseudo-classicism of the Parnassians. The real contribution of the so-called Romantic movement, then, was one of release from academically organized repression,—repression in form, in thought, in expression, which are but so many aspects of the genetic impulse, and not detachable entities that may be re-arranged at will. The measure of literary repression may be taken as one of the measures of classicism; the measure of release from that repression may be taken as one of the measures of romanticism. To argue in favour of one or the other or to attempt to draw too definite a line between them is a futile implication of the possibility of uniformity and, moreover, is to shift the criteria of art from an esthetic to a moralistic basis. There are really as many “isms” as there are creative individuals; classic and romantic are aspects of all creative endeavour rather than definite and opposing qualities. The observation which I translate herewith from Wolf relates Romanticism to its originally individualistic importance as applied to nations. “The accessory ideas that have been grafted upon that of Romanticism as a result of its decadence,” writes the German critic, “serve only to confuse the etymological and historical truth of this definition. It is for the same reasons that the art of the Middle Ages, proper to modern peoples and opposed to antiquity, has been named Romantic, or rather, Roman. In order to re-establish the continuity of their spontaneous development and to paralyze the modern influence of the humanists, the reformists, classicism and rationalism, these same peoples had to turn back and drink from the ever abundant springs of the Middle Ages,—a brilliant epoch of development which was more in conformity with their genius. This is another reason why the two terms Middle Ages and Romanticism have been confused. But as this poetry and art of the Middle Ages are bigoted, excessively idealistic, taking pleasure in mysticism and the fantastic, these diverse acceptations have been wrongly given to romanticism. Taking the accessory for the central nucleus, modern romanticism has caricatured all this and discredited true romanticism, so that the name in the realms of art has been applied to everything that is subjective, arbitrary, nebulous, capricious and without fixed form.”
[2] A new Muse now inspires my song. No more do I grasp the pagan lyre. My soul, imitate nature. Who can surpass her beauty? By day, by night, sing praises to the Lord; chant the wonders of the Creator.
[3] Our fatherland is wherever we live a life free of pain and grief; where friendly faces surround us, where we have love; where friendly voices console us in our misfortune and where a few eyes will weep their sorrow over our solitary grave.
[4] My land has graceful palm-trees, where sings the sabiá. The birds that warble here (i. e., in Portugal, where he wrote the poem) don’t warble as ours over there.
[5] The critic here refers to João Baptista da Silva Leitão Almeida Garrett (1799-1854) who together with Alexandre Herculano (1810-1877) dominated the Portuguese Romantic epoch.
[6] Love is life; it is to hold one’s soul, one’s senses, one’s heart, open ever to the great, the beautiful; to be capable of extremes, of lofty virtues and lowest crimes; to understand the infinite, the vastness, Nature and God, to enjoy the fields; the birds, the flowers, solitary murmurs; to seek sadness, solitude, the desert, to fill the heart with laughter and festivity; and to inundate the smiling fête, the laughter of our soul, with fountains of tears; to know pleasure and misfortune at the same time and to be at once the happiest and the most wretched of mortals: This is love, the love of which one dies. To love, and not know, not possess the courage to speak the love we feel within us; to fear lest profane eyes cast their defiling glance into the temple where is concentrated the best portion of our lives; where like misers we conceal this fountain of love, these inexhaustible treasures of flourishing illusions; to feel the presence of the adored one, though she be not seen, to understand, without hearing her speak, her thoughts; to follow her, without being able to gaze into her eyes; to love her without being able to say that we love. And, fearing to brush her garments, to burn to stifle her in a thousand embraces. This is love, the love of which one dies!