Castro Alves

Life in Recife

At age fourteen, Castro Alves moved to Recife with his older brother to enroll in a preparatory course for the Faculty of Law. He quickly became involved in the social life of the academic youth, participating in public sessions at the faculty, student societies, and theatre audiences, where he received applause and ovations. Initially, the brothers lived in the Convent of São Francisco, then moved to a dormitory on Rua do Hospício, where their future brother-in-law Augusto Álvares Guimarães later lived.

According to Xavier Marques, while his brother read Álvares de Azevedo to asylum inmates, Castro Alves played billiards, drew, and wrote verses. Luís Cornélio dos Santos, a close friend, reported that they later lived in a remote neighborhood on the banks of the Capibaribe, where he accompanied Alves on walks during which he read poems from a notebook that was later lost. Santos described Alves's soul as having unsurpassable purity and his intelligence as dazzling like lightning, comparing him to a young Victor Hugo.

In Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo

On 10 February 1868, Castro Alves embarked for Rio de Janeiro with Eugênia, carrying a recommendation letter to José de Alencar. Alves read sketches of "A Cascata de Paulo Afonso" to Alencar, who subsequently published the article "Um Poeta" in the Correio Mercantil and introduced Alves to Machado de Assis, calling him the "Poet of Slaves." During his stay in Rio, a victory in the Paraguayan War led to street celebrations, and Alves recited a warrior poem from the balcony of the Diário do Rio de Janeiro newspaper, though he later wrote on the manuscript "do not publish it." Scenes from his play "Gonzaga" were also presented at the newspaper to a small audience. In March, he traveled with Eugênia to São Paulo, where he gained admiration from the youth and provoked jealousy from figures such as Joaquim Nabuco.

Work

Slavery was prevalent in Brazil under Emperor Pedro II, with 47% of the captive population in the Northeast in 1867, while coffee cultivation in São Paulo doubled the number of slaves between 1864 and 1874. The slave trade from Africa had been prohibited since 1850 by the Eusébio de Queirós Law, though the last documented attempt to circumvent it was the Pontinha Landing on Itaparica Island in 1851. Brazil had only two law schools, in Recife and São Paulo, where liberal and civic ideas were instilled in the elite, influenced by European authors such as Ernest Renan, Hippolyte Taine, and Auguste Comte.

These ideas, along with evolutionism, realism, and naturalism, fostered a desire for reform. In Europe, revolutions in France in 1830 and 1847 led to the first direct, secret, and universal male suffrage on the continent, while Italy and Germany experienced nationalist unification struggles, with Giuseppe Garibaldi, married to the Brazilian Anita, playing a role in Italy.

Homages

Ten years after Castro Alves's death, on 6 July 1881, the Largo do Teatro in Salvador was renamed in his honor. A statue by Italian sculptor Pasquale de Chirico, measuring 2.9 meters on an 11-meter pedestal featuring a sculpture of a couple of slaves, was inaugurated on 6 July 1923 at Castro Alves Square, now a symbol of Salvador. In 1895, the municipality of Curralinho was emancipated from Cachoeira and later renamed Castro Alves, though sources differ on whether this occurred by State Law No. 360 of 25 July 1900 or Law No. 790 of 25 June 1910.

The centenary of his birth in 1947 was celebrated by the Instituto Nacional do Livro with a large exhibition and a commemorative book. A theater project in Praça 2 de Julho, proposed in 1948 and named after the poet, faced a mysterious fire five days before its scheduled inauguration on 4 July 1958, but after nine years of renovations, the Teatro Castro Alves was finally inaugurated on 4 March 1967 and has been listed by IPHAN as national heritage since 2013.

Did You Know?

• Castro Alves had the family nickname 'Cecéu' and was cared for by the maid Leopoldina, who told him stories of the sertão.
• On the eve of his death, after being given a mirror, he said, 'I am no longer the same... How death disfigures its victims!' and asked to be covered with flowers and his coffin closed immediately.
• He pretended to stab himself with a paper dagger when seeing Esther, a Jewish woman who had inspired him, pass by his window.