Camilo Castelo Branco

Camilo Ferreira Botelho Castelo Branco (Mártires (Lisbon), March 16, 1825 – June 1, 1890; São Miguel de Seide) is one of the authors most representative of Portuguese literature of all time and one of the most read.

Portuguese writer of late Romanticism, he had an eventful, passionate and impulsive life, which served as inspiration for his novels. He published important and highly echoed novels, such as Love of perdition , Love of salvation , The novel of a rich man or later Prazins' Brazilian .

Biography

Born from an extramarital relationship, he soon became an orphan of both father and mother. His education was then carried out by more or less close relatives. In adolescence he trained by reading Portuguese and Latin classics. At the age of sixteen he married Joaquina Pereira whom he soon forgot and with whom he had a daughter who died at the age of five. He began studying medicine, but did not finish his degree. When he had not yet widowed her, in Vila Real he kidnapped a young orphan girl from whom he had another daughter and whom he also abandoned. Throughout his life there were tumultuous loves with Patrícia Emília and Isabel Cándida, among others.

In 1848 he began his literary career by settling in the city of Oporto, where he frequented the gatherings at the Guichard café along with some promising artists of the romantic generation. At this time, while leading a bohemian life, he wrote his anti-Cabralist satires and his first novels published in serial form in the newspapers Eco popular and Nacional .

His personal life then continued along a path of adventures and intrigues until he fell madly in love with Ana Plácido. It is said that she succumbed to a mystical crisis when she decided to marry Pinheiro Alves, a Brazilian who would later serve as inspiration in some of her novels, and for this reason she attended the Oporto seminary (from 1850 to 1852). Already famous in the Portuguese literary scene, he once again became the protagonist of a scandal when Ana Plácido abandoned her husband to live with him in Lisbon.

From now on, Camilo's life and work mature due to hardships: persecutions, serious economic problems and prison after both of them were tried for adultery. Camilo entered prison on October 1, 1860 at the Cadeia da Relação (now the Portuguese Center of Photography), in Porto, and was released on October 16, 1861. Once acquitted, Camilo and Ana live together and she will be a source of inspiration of some of her novels (she will be called Enriqueta in Poetry or money, Raquel in Años de prose, Adriana in In the good Jesús del Monte or Leonor in The novel of a rich man). Camilo will have to write at a frenetic pace due to serious financial problems that do not end.

In 1862 he returned to Lisbon. In 1864 he moved to the house of S. Miguel de Ceide, where he was the husband of Ana, who had already died. Here he will write the best of his work, although unfortunately, he will not find tranquility or peace either. In 1868 his son Jorge became ill and would never recover from his serious mental problems.

In 1878 he suffered an accident on a train and as a result his eyesight was damaged. Other upsets such as the death of a three-year-old granddaughter or the irresponsibility of his eldest son lead him to despair. Camilo continues writing, his friends try to help him and prepare tributes for him. In 1885 he was given the title of Viscount of Correia Botelho. On March 9, 1888 he married Ana Plácido. Camilo spends his life next to her until the last years of his life, without finding the emotional stability that he longed for. He has financial difficulties, and he will be publicly recognized as a writer, so in 1889 he is granted an annual pension of 1,000,000 reales, but nothing provides him peace or stability. His children give him enormous worries: he considers Nuno irresponsible, and Jorge suffers from a mental illness.

In 1890, desperate for confirmation from an ophthalmologist that his progressive blindness had no cure, he shot himself in the right temple at 3 p.m. and died two hours later at his home in S. Miguel de Ceide. The death of Camilo Castelo Branco caused general consternation and the press, unanimous in regretting his death, published numerous articles praising him as a writer.

Novels

His first serious novel is The Mysteries of Lisbon (1854), serial-style and clearly influenced by Balzac and Sue. Others followed in which he recreated the bourgeois and provincial life of northern Portugal, and indirectly exposed anti-clerical ideas and instigation of social revolution.

We must highlight, of course, his great passionate novels, The novel of a rich man, Love of perdition (1862) and Love of salvation (1864), Cuentos del Miño (1875-1877), a realistic portrait of the rural environment in twelve stories, or the historical novel The Jew (1866).

Amor de perdition 1861, perhaps his most perfect work, is the most famous and the one that best represents the Portuguese romanticism of the century XIX, as Unamuno already recognized in Through the lands of Portugal and Spain. In it, passion prevails over reason. The novel contains all the characteristic elements of the romantic ideal: fatal and tragic love that ends up leading to death, self-punishment imposed by the protagonists themselves or death as the sole and absolute end. As in Romeo and Juliet, Simón Botello and Teresa de Albuquerque (true heroes in conflict with society) are two neighbors who fall in love and see each other secretly because they belong to feuding families who will do everything possible to prevent the union. Love of Salvation, two years later, returns to that theme but with a more indirect tone and with some humor.

Other important works are: Fatal Stars, Good and Evil (1863), Auspicious Stars (1863), The femme fatale (1870, five women pass through Carlos's life and are masterfully described because each one corresponds to a facet of the author's feminine concept), "Ten happy marriages" (twelve stories of lucky marriages where it is stated that the basis of a good marriage is reciprocated love), Heart, head, stomach (a satire of customs, a forceful social criticism of vulgarity and hypocrisy of Portuguese society).

Camilo's novels present different themes and techniques. There are very numerous historical novels such as Fight of Giants, The Jew, The Saint of the Mountain, The Regicide and The Skull of the Martyr.

It is worth adding The Fall of an Angel (1866, another satire, in this case about corruption). And other valuable novels are also The Witch of Monte Córdoba (1867), The Madwoman of Candal (1867), The Mysteries of Fafe (1868), The Portrait of Ricardina (1868) or Book of Consolation (1872). The late novel La brasileña de Prazins usually stands out (one of the author's last great works in which a woman named Marta suffers from crossed loves).

The long stories that make up the Novelas del Miño (1875-77) are considered realistic due to their description of everyday life. In others, such as Eusebio Macario (1879) and La plebe (1880), he imitates naturalist ideas by ridiculing them, while in La brasileña de Prazins (1882), elements of naturalism appear without that objective of parody, as we also see in his last novel, Mud Volcanoes (1886).

In addition to the novel, a genre in which he stands out, he addressed comedy, poetry, journalism, biography, satire, essays; and he made translations from English and French, historical studies, prefaces...

For the theater he wrote the dramas Agostiño de Ceuta (1847) and El marqués de Torres Nuevas (1849). He also stood out as a critic and polemicist (The critics of the cheerful songbook, 1879).

Balance

Camilo's work is part of Romanticism, specifically in the second phase of Portuguese Romanticism called Ultra-Romanticism. However, not all of his work is romantic. He writes on the border of romantic idealism and the new realist school, although he criticized realism as immoral. The adventures and ideology of many of his characters are romantic but the descriptions of types, places and customs are realistic—veristic, he said. He especially excels when it comes to describing the psychology of the characters. But in his latest novels (which are not the best) he will approach, despite himself, Naturalism. If anything, his romanticism is tempered by irony.

His life is the source of his novels as well as makes their understanding possible. The continuous instability of his place of residence (Trás-os-Montes, Vila Real, Lisbon, Oporto, Coímbra...) and the wealth of personal experiences made possible the masterful description of human types of all social classes in his work: the peasant, the provincial nobleman, the urban bourgeoisie, the Brazilian, etc.

Sometimes he signed pseudonyms such as: Manoel Coco, Saragoçano, AEIOU, Árqui-Zero and Ao, a romantic writer, love is the great theme of many of his novels. It is a feeling that leads to breaking with the rules of society and triggers serious conflicts. Individualism and passion collide with social limits. Due to this struggle, the universal theme is also frequent: Good and evil , which is one of the titles of his novels.

Other recurring themes in his novels are: bastardy, orphanhood, the right to individual freedom, family relationships, the relationship between Christian religion and metaphysics, anticlericalism, popular sentiment, the ambivalent description of women, (which saves and condemns), criticism of society, etc. For this, and for his great quality, he was praised by Miguel de Unamuno.

Its echo in the Portuguese novelists of the first half of the XX century has been manifest (as in Aquilino Ribeiro). Its current presence is evident in the literature of Agustina Bessa-Luís (several essays, a novel) or in the cinema of Manoel de Oliveira (on several occasions, especially with The Day of Despair) and by Raoul Ruiz, The mysteries of Lisbon.

Camilo's House

Camilo's House is located in S. Miguel de Ceide, near Braga. It does not meet the main characteristics of a residence of the Brazilian who returned to Portugal, Pinheiro Alves, who built it in 1830. After his death (perhaps facilitated by the displeasure caused by the acquittal of his wife, Ana Plácido, and Camilo Castelo Branco by the Tribunal da Relação of Oporto), the novelist settled there in the winter of 1863.

It had a devastating fire in 1915, and the building was rebuilt and transformed into the Camiliano Museum in 1922. But its original layout was altered by including an elementary school on the ground floor. Everything was reworked in the 1950s, and today it provides visitors with a layout of the interiors and atmosphere very similar to those of the residence that the writer lived in. The important house-museum allows us to see what his home, furniture, books and objects were like during the final twenty-five years of his life, in an environment almost identical to what the writer saw until his death.

Next to it, a Camillian Studies Center has recently been built by the architect Siza Vieira.

Works

• Communion (1851)
• Things I just know (1854)
• Mysteries of Lisbon (1854)
• The daughter of the Arcedian (1854)
• Black Book of Father Dinis (1855)
• The granddaughter of the Arcedian (1856)
• Where is happiness? (1856)
• A man of Bríos (1856)
• Blessed tears
• Scenes of Foz
• Carlota Angela (1858)
• Revenge
• What Women Do (1858)
• The firstborn of Faphé in Lisbon (theater, 1861)
• Twelve happy marriages (1861)
• The novel of a rich man (1861). Recent Tr: four.ediciones, 2011, ISBN 978-84-938566-1-8, with bio-bibliography
• The three sisters (1862)
• Love of perdition (1862). Recent Tr: Espasa-Calpe, 2003, ISBN 978-84-670-1009-1; and Alliance, 2008, ISBN 978-84-206-6830-7
• Strange things
• Ironically. (1862)
• Heart, head and stomach (1862)
• Fun stars
• Years of prose (1863)
• Adventures of Basilio Fernández Enxertado (1863)
• Good and Evil (1863)
• Propitious stars (1863)
• Memories of Guillermo de Amaral (1863)
• A needle in a haystack (1863)
• Love of salvation (1864). Recent draft: four editions, 2012, ISBN 978-84-938566-3-2
• The daughter of Dr. Black (1864)
• Twenty hours in bunk (1864)
• The skeleton (1865)
• The mermaid (1865)
• The repudiated (1866)
• The Jew (1866)
• The Crystal Eye (1866)
• The Fall of an Angel (1866); Recent Tr.: Youth, ISBN 978-84-261-5581-8.
• The saint of the mountain (1866)
• The witch of Monte Córdoba (1867)
• The Crazy Candal (1867)
• The Mysteries of Fafe (1868)
• The portrait of Ricardina 1868)
• The jewels of the Brazilian (1869)
• The fatal woman (1870)
• Consolation book (1872)
• The Regid (1874)
• The daughter of the widower (1875)
• The skull of the martyr (1876)
• Novels of the Miño (1875-1877)
• Eusebio Macario (1879)
• The fold (1880)
• The Brazilian of Prazins (1882). Recent: Chair, 2002 ISBN 978-84-376-2049-7
• Side volcanoes (1886).

After the exhaustive publications of his books in the Portuguese XX century, a new careful edition of Works by the author, in Edições Caixotim of Porto, but which has been parked in 16 titles; It contains variants and very new introductions.

Recommended bibliography

• Bessa-Luís, Agustina, “O Romanesco em Camilo: Ajeitada”, in Colloquium/Letras No. 54, pp. 5-14, 1980.
• Cabral, Alexandre, Direction of Camilo Castelo BrancoLisbon, Caminho, 1989.
• Cabral, António, Profile track1914; Shirt unsuspecting1918, As polemics of Camilo1925, Camilo Castelo Branco: roteiro dramatic dum proffissional das letras, Centro de Estudos Camilianos, 2a ed., 1988. and Camilo e Eça de Queirós1924.
• Cesar, Oldemiro, C.C.B., Sua vida e sua obra, 1914
• De Meneses, Ludovico, Camilo (Documents e facto novos)1924.
• De Pratt, Alfredo, Biographical Memories of C.C.B.1906.
• Fortune, Freitas, Hours of mourning1889.
• - In memoriam de Camilo, edition of Ventura Abrantes, Lisbon, 1925
• Jalon, Mauricio, "Apuntes sobre Camilo", epilogo a Love of salvation, Four, 2012, ISBN 978-84-938566-3-2
• Lima Calheiros, José Pedro de, Catalogue das obras de Camilo Castelo Branco, Visconde de Correa Botelho, Porto, 1889, and Additamento e continuação das obras de Camillo Castelo Branco, Porto, 1890.
• Lopes, Óscar, “Camilo Castelo Branco” and “Concepção da vida na ficção de Camilo” in Álbum de Familia: ensaios sobre autores portugueses do século XIX. Lisbon, Caminho, 1984.
• Marques, Henrique, Bibliographia Camilianapart, Lisbon, 1894.
• Marques, Henrique, As tiragens speciais da obra de Camilo, in A RevistaPort, 1903-1904.
• Mateus, J.A. “Na história dum projecto impossivel: on the purpose of “Duas eras na vida de Camilo” to Coloquio/Letras No. 30, 1976, pp. 41-52.
• Mota, João Xavier da, Camilliana. Colecção das obras de Camillo Castelo BrancoRio de Janeiro, 1891.
• Neves, Alvaro, Camilo Castello Branco. Notes à margem em vários livros da sua biblioteva recolhidas por..., Lisbon, 1916, 161 pp.
• Neves, Alvaro, "Estudos Camilianos - Bibliographia e Bibliotheconomia", Lisbon, 1917, 16 p.
• Pimentel, Alberto, Or Romance romance1890; You love Camillo1899; Uma visit ao primeito romancista português em S. Miguel de Ceide1885; and Memosrias do tempo de Camilo1913.
• Prado Coelho, Jacinto do, Introdução ao estudio da novel camiliana, Lisbon, Imprensa Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 3a ed., 2001.
• Santos, Manoel dos, Revista Bibliografica CamilianaLisbon, 1916, III vols.
• Santos, José dos, Descrição bibliográfica da mais importante e valor Camiliana que até hoje tem aparece à venda no mercado compreendendo tôdas as obras originais, traduzidas ou prefaciadas por Camilo Castelo Branco tanto em suas primeiras como em susequentes ediçõesLisbon, 1939.
• Seine, Freitas, Profile of C. Castelo Branco1888.
• Sena, Jorge de, Portuguese Literature StudsLisbon, Ediçóes 70, 1982-1988
• Teixera de Carvalho, J.M., Two chapters on C.C.B., 1922
• See Castrol, J.C., Camilo Castelo Branco, Notícia da sua vida e Obras1861.