LuÃs Romano de Madeira Melo (10 June 1922 – 22 January 2010) was a bilingual poet, novelist, and folklorist who has written in Portuguese and the Capeverdean Crioulo of Santo Antão.
Biography
Born in the northernmost town of
Ponta do Sol
Ponta do Sol (; ) is a municipality in the southwestern coast of the island of Madeira, in the archipelago of Madeira. The population in 2011 was 8,862, in an area of .
History
The settlement of Ponta do Sol began shortly after the discovery of t ...
in the Capeverdean island of Santo Antão, he prefers to refer to the Capeverdean language as "lÃngua cabo-verdiana". He collaborated along with additional publishers and founded the ''Morabeza'' review. An independent idealist, he edited local and international literary reviews.
In the late 1950s, LuÃs Romano joined the ideas of independence and became member of the
PAIGC
The African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (, PAIGC) is a political party in Guinea-Bissau. Originally formed to peacefully campaign for independence from Portugal, the party turned to armed conflict in the 1960s and was o ...
, captured by PIDE, he went to exile in Senegal, then Mauritania and Morocco where he travelled with an engineer from the salt industry,
Algiers
Algiers is the capital city of Algeria as well as the capital of the Algiers Province; it extends over many Communes of Algeria, communes without having its own separate governing body. With 2,988,145 residents in 2008Census 14 April 2008: Offi ...
and
Paris
Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
, Romano lived in Brazil for the remainder of his life. He visited his home country in
Praia
Praia (, Portuguese for "beach") is the capital and largest city of Cape Verde.
In 1985, he wrote a historical book ''Cem Anos de Literatura Caboverdiana'' (''Hundred Years of Cape Verdean Literature'') relating to the past hundred years of literature of his country, it included notable writers of the time such as
Baltasar Lopes da Silva
Baltasar Lopes da Silva (23 April 1907 – 8 May 1989) was a writer, poet and linguist from Cape Verde, who wrote in both Portuguese and Cape Verdean Creole. With Manuel Lopes and Jorge Barbosa, he was the founder of '' Claridade''. In 1947 ...
OvÃdio Martins
OvÃdio de Sousa Martins (September 17, 1928 in Mindelo, São Vicente – April 29, 1999 in Lisbon, Portugal) was a famous Cape Verdean poet and journalist. He attended high school in his home country, went to pursue studies in PortugalLobba ...
as well as the '' Claridade'' review in which some of the greatest writers took part, as well as '' Certeza'' and ''Morabeza''.
He established the official linguistic material of ''Kriolander'' in the whole archipelago. He published his first novel ''Famintos'' (''Famine'', ''Hunger''), about the deaths of several Cape Verdeans during the drought of the 1940s, it was written in 1940, as it was censored at the time, it was published in Brazil in 1962. He also wrote poems especially ''Negrume'' (''Lzimparim'') which was published in
Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro, or simply Rio, is the capital of the Rio de Janeiro (state), state of Rio de Janeiro. It is the List of cities in Brazil by population, second-most-populous city in Brazil (after São Paulo) and the Largest cities in the America ...
Afonso Dias
Afonso Dias is a Portuguese singer, musician, poet and actor. He was deputy of the Constitution Assembly of 1975/76 under the Popular Democratic Union (Portugal) (later, he was not involved in other political offices). In music, he was one of ...
to 1985
* ''Ilha'' (1991): Short stories from "Europafrica" and "Brasilamerica"; in Portuguese and partially in Crioulo)
* ''Kriolanda - Estigmas'', 1999, São Vicente
* ''Kabverd Civilização e Cultura'', 2000, Rio de Janeiro
Short-Stories
* "Nho Zidôr" (in ''Ilha''), "Pasaport Kabverd" (in ''Ilha''), "Daluz" (in ''Negrume''), "Tánha" (in ''Negrume''), "Destino" (in ''Negrume''), "Estórias de Tipêde i Tilôbe" (in ''Cabo Verde-Renascença de uma civilização...'')
Éthiopiques
''Éthiopiques'' is a series of compact discs featuring Ethiopian singers and musicians. Many of the CDs compile songs from various singles and albums that Amha Records, Kaifa Records and Philips-Ethiopia released during the 1960s and 1970s in Et ...
'', no 27, July 1981
*"Romano, LuÃs", ''Merriam-Webster's encyclopedia of literature'', Merriam-Webster, 1995, p. 964