Teixeira de Melo (born José Alexandre Teixeira de Melo) was a Brazilian doctor, journalist, historian and poet. He was born in
Campos, Rio de Janeiro, on August 28, 1833, and died in
Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...
on April 10, 1907. He was the founder of Chair 6 of the
Brazilian Academy of Letters
The Academia Brasileira de Letras (ABL) ( English: ''Brazilian Academy of Letters'') is a Brazilian literature, literary non-profit society established at the end of the 19th century. The first president, Machado de Assis, declared its found ...
, choosing as a patron the poet
Casimiro de Abreu
Casimiro José Marques de Abreu (January 4, 1839 – October 18, 1860) was a Brazilian poet, novelist and playwright, adept of the "Ultra-Romanticism" movement. He is famous for the poem "Meus oito anos".
He is patron of the 6th chair of the Br ...
, who was his friend. He was replaced by
Admiral Jaceguai.
He was the son of José Alexandre Teixeira de Melo and Eugênia Maria da Conceição Torres. He studied humanities at the São José Seminary and graduated from the Faculty of Medicine of Rio de Janeiro, where he defended his thesis on November 25, 1859. He settled in Campos, where he ran a medical clinic and contributed to newspapers, until 1875. He then moved to Rio de Janeiro. As a journalist, he signed articles with his own name and also with the pseudonym Anódino. He was a member of several literary organizations. He published a book of poems ''Sombras e Sonhos'' in 1858. In 1876 he was appointed head of the Manuscripts Section of the National Library, later moving to the Print Section and, finally, taking over the direction of the Library in 1895. He held the position until 1900, when he retired. He traveled through Europe during 1892 and 1893.
A tireless researcher, he dedicated himself to matters of national history, researching, in the manuscript archives, the documents that would secure the rights of Brazil to contested territories, serving as the basis for the arguments of
Joaquim Nabuco
Joaquim Aurélio Barreto Nabuco de Araújo (August 19, 1849 – January 17, 1910) was a Brazilian writer, statesman, and a leading voice in the abolitionist movement of his country.
Early life and education
Born in Brazil, Joaquim was the son ...
and
Rio Branco. He published several valuable works, such as ''Efemérides nacionais e Limites do Brasil com a Confederação Argentina.'' He wrote for the Annals of the National Library, in the Revista do Instituto Histórico e Geográfico Brasileiro, in the Gazeta Literária and in other publications.
As a poet, Teixeira de Melo belonged to the romantic generation of Casimiro de Abreu,
Luís Delfino and
Luís Guimarães. In the preface to his Poetry (1914),
Sílvio Romero
Sílvio Vasconcelos da Silveira Ramos Romero (April 21, 1851 – June 18, 1914) was a Brazilian " Condorist" poet, essayist, literary critic, professor, journalist, historian and politician.
He founded and occupied the 17th chair of the Brazilian ...
qualified him as “a first-rate lyricist”, who is distinguished by “a certain singularity, a certain graceful and delicate elevation of the phrases”, in addition to the complete correctness of language and metric form, characteristics that make his work a precursor to Parnassianism.
Bio
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References
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Brazilian poets