João Cabral de Melo Neto

João Cabral de Melo Neto

João Cabral de Melo Neto (1920–1999) was born in the state of Pernambuco, Brazil, and is considered one of the greatest Brazilian poets of all time.

He is often quoted saying "I try not to perfume the flower". His works are said to be dry, devoid of exaggerated emotions that are usually associated with poetry, sticking usually to images and actions and physical descriptions rather than feelings. The image of an engineer designing a building is often used to describe his poetry. It usually follows a strict meter and assonant rhymes.

He worked as a diplomat for most of his life.

In 1990, he won the Camões Prize, the greatest prize in literature of the Portuguese language. In 1992, João Cabral received the Neustadt International Prize for Literature, which some consider to be almost as prestigious as the Nobel Prize.

He occupied the 37th chair of the Brazilian Academy of Letters from 1968 until his death in 1999.

It was a Brazilian poet and diplomat. His poetry, ranging from a tendency to surrealist folk poetry, but characterized by esthetic rigor with a confessional poems averse and marked by the use of rhymes toantes, inaugurated a new form of poetry in Brazil.Brother of the historian Evaldo Cabral de Melo and cousin of the poet Manuel Bandeira and the sociologist Gilberto Freyre, John Cabral was a friend of the painter Joan Miró and the poet Joan Brossa. Member Pernambuco Academy of Arts and the Brazilian Academy of Letters, was awarded several literary prizes. When he died in 1999, speculated that it was a strong contender for the Nobel Prize in Literature.

He was married to Stella Maria Barbosa de Oliveira, with whom he had sons Rodrigo, Inez, Luiz, Elizabeth and John married in second marriage in 1986, with the poet Marly de Oliveira.

His poetry is art

In the poetry of Cabral are some perceive dualities antithetical worked with some baroque and exhaustion. Between time and space, between inside and outside, between the massive and non-massive, between male and female, between the northeast and Andalusia desert fertile, or between the Savanna and humid desert Pernambuco. It is a poetry that causes some strangeness who expects an emotional poetry, because his work is basically brain and "sensationalist" seeking a constructive and communicative poetry, objective.

Although there is a tendency in his surrealist poems, especially in the initial, as in Stone Sleep, seeking a poetry that was also significant, Melo Neto need not resort to pathos ("passion") to create a poetic atmosphere, avoiding any romantic trend , but seeks an elaborate construction of language and thought and said of his poetry, turning the whole image perception in something concrete and related to the senses, especially to the touch, as can be seen well in a single-blade knife. In this poem, Cabral presents the image of the knife through the feeling of emptiness that makes the knife in the flesh, contrasting with the very solid knife that

Some words are systematically used in poetry by this author: sugar cane, stone, bone, skeleton, tooth-edged, razor, knife, scythe blade, cut, skinned, bay watch, dry, mineral, desert, aseptic, empty, hungry. Things sound and tactile sensations: a poetry of concrete.

Nobel literature: never. It was rejected several times for the Nobel (which until now have never been given is a Brazilian) and even then, not because of the prize that was never considered important. He received numerous awards in Brazil and abroad, always leaving their mark, and even he was the great inspirer of the concrete movement in Brazil and the world.

Works

Melo Neto's most famous poems are:

• "Morte e Vida Severina" (translated in part by Elizabeth Bishop as "Death and Life of a Severino"), his most famous work, is a very long narrative poem (in most editions it goes over 80 pages) that describes the life of a poor country man in the dry northeastern part of Brazil.
• "Uma Faca só Lâmina" (A Knife All Blade) is also considered to be one of his best works, and was translated to English in 1980. The poem is about the many ways to describe "that sorrowful absence in a man".
• "Cão sem Plumas" (A Dog Without Feathers) describes the Capibaribe River of Pernambuco, and the poverty-stricken community that surrounds it.

His poetic works, a trend that goes to the surrealist poetry popular, characterized by aesthetic rigor, with poems averse to confessionalism and marked by the use of toantes rhymes, inaugurated a new form of poetry in Brazil.

Poetry

• Pedra do Sono [Rock of the Sleep] (1942)
• Os Três Mal-Amados [The Three Not-loved] (1943)
• O Engenheiro [The Engineer] (1945)
• Psicologia da Composição com a Fábula de Anfion e Antiode (1947)
• O Cão Sem Plumas [The Dog Without Feathers] (1950)
• O Rio ou Relação da Viagem que Faz o Capibaribe de Sua Nascente à Cidade do Recife [The River or Relation of the trip that Capibaribe does from its source until the Town of Recife] (1954)
• Dois Parlamentos [Two Parliaments] (1960)
• Quaderna (1960)
• A Educação pela Pedra [The Education through the Rock] (1966)
• Museu de Tudo [Museum of Everything] (1975)
• A Escola das Facas [The School of the Knives] (1980)
• Auto do Frade (1984)
• Agrestes (1985)
• Crime na Calle Relator (1987)
• Primeiros Poemas [First Poems] (1990)
• Sevilha Andando [Walking Sevilla] (1990)

Further reading

English

• Education by stone : selected poems / João Cabral de Melo Neto; Richard Zenith., 2005
• Selected poetry, 1937-1990 / João Cabral de Melo Neto; Djelal Kadir., 1994
• The aesthetics of the object in the poetry of João Cabral de Melo Neto / Marta Peixoto., 1977
• The poem and the canvas: pictorial implications in the works of João Cabral de Melo Neto / Danilo Pinto Lôbo., 1972
• João Cabral de Melo Neto / Benedito Nunes., 1971

Portuguese

• João Cabral de Melo Neto : o homem sem alma ; Diário de tudo / José Castello., 2006
• Os signos de uma educação : a água e a pedra na poética de João Cabral de Melo Neto / Walter Filho., 2003
• O poeta e a mídia : Carlos Drummond de Andrade e João Cabral de Melo Neto / Fábio Lucas., 2002
• O poema no sistema : a peculiaridade do antilírico João Cabral na poesia brasileira / Homero Araújo., 2002
• João Cabral e o poema dramático, Auto do frade / Níobe Abreu Peixoto., 2001
• João Cabral de Melo Neto / João Alexandre Barbosa., 2001
• A poesia crítica de João Cabral de Melo Neto / Helton Gonçalves de Souza., 1999
• João Cabral : a poesia do menos e outros ensaios cabralinos / Antonio Carlos Secchin., 1999
• João Cabral de Melo Neto : o homem sem alma / José Castello., 1996
• A bailadora andaluza : a explosão do sagrado na poesia de João Cabral / Waldecy Tenório., 1996
• João Cabral em perspectiva / Maria do Carmo Campos., 1995
• Lira e antilira : Mário, Drummond, Cabral / Luiz Costa Lima., 1995
• Manuel e João : dois poetas pernambucanos / Assis Brasil., 1990

Spanish

• Piedra fundamental : poesia y prosa / João Cabral de Melo Neto., 2002
• Idéias fixas de João Cabral de Melo Neto / Félix de Athayde., 1998
• A la medida de la mano / Angel Crespo., 1994

External links

• Academia Brasileira de Letras profile of João Cabral de Melo Neto
• Encyclopaedia Britannica Joao Cabral de Melo Neto

Preceded by Assis Chateaubriand

Brazilian Academy of Letters - Occupant of the 37th chair 1968 — 1999

Succeeded by Ivan Junqueira