Francisco Manuel de Mello - Literary Endeavors

Literary Endeavors

He returned home in 1659, and from then until 1663 we find him on and off in Lisbon, frequenting the celebrated Academia dos Generosos, of which he was five times elected president. In the last year he proceeded to Parma and Rome, by way of England, and France, and Afonso VI of Portugal charged him to negotiate with the Curia about the provision of bishops for Portuguese sees and to report on suitable marriages for the king and his brother. During his stay in Rome he published his Obras morales, dedicated to Queen Catherine, wife of Charles II of England, and his Cartas familiares. On his way back to Portugal he printed his Obras Métricas at Lyon in May 1665, and he died in Lisbon the following year.

Manuel de Mello's early Spanish verses are tainted with Gongorism, but his Portuguese sonnets and cartas on moral subjects are notable for their power, sincerity, and perfection of form. He strove successfully to emancipate himself from foreign faults of style, and by virtue of his native genius, and his knowledge of the traditional poetry of the people, and the best Quinhentista models, he became Portugal's leading lyric poet and prose writer of the 17th century. As with Luís de Camões, imprisonments and exile contributed to make Manuel de Melo a great writer: His Letters, addressed to the leading nobles, ecclesiastics, diplomats and literati of the time, are written in a conversational style, lighted up by flashes of wit and enriched with apposite illustrations and quotations. His commerce with the best authors appears in the Hospital des lettras, a brilliant chapter of criticism forming part of the Apologos dialogaes. His comedy in redondilhas, the Auto do Fidalgo Aprendiz, is one of the last anti; quite the worthiest production of the school of Gil Vicente, and may be considered an anticipation of Molière's Le Bourgeois gentilhomme.