Brazilian Literature - Colonial Period

Colonial Period

The first extant document that might be considered Brazilian literature is the Carta de Pero Vaz de Caminha (Pero Vaz de Caminha's letter). It is written by Pero Vaz de Caminha to Manuel I of Portugal, which contains a description of what Brazil looked like in 1500. Journals of voyagers and descriptive treatises on "Portuguese America" dominated the literary production for the next two centuries, including well-known accounts by Jean de Léry and Hans Staden, whose story of his encounter with the Tupi Indians on the coast of São Paulo was extraordinarily influential for European conceptions of the New World.

A few more explicitly literary examples survive from this period, such as Basílio da Gama's epic poem celebrating the conquest of the Missions by the Portuguese, and the work of Gregório de Mattos, a 17th century lawyer from Salvador who produced a sizable amount of satirical, religious, and secular poetry. Matos drew heavily from Baroque influences such as the Spanish poets Luis de Góngora and Francisco de Quevedo.

Neoclassicism was widespread in Brazil during the mid-18th century, following the Italian style. Literature was often produced by members of temporary or semi-permanent academies and most of the content was in the pastoral genre. The most important literary centre in colonial Brazil was the prosperous Minas Gerais region, known for its gold mines, where a thriving proto-nationalist movement had begun. The most important poets were Cláudio Manuel da Costa, Tomás Antônio Gonzaga, Alvarenga Peixoto and Manuel Inácio da Silva Alvarenga, all them involved in an uprising against the colonial power. Gonzaga and Costa were exiled to Africa as a consequence.