Prado, João Fernando de Almeida (1898–1987)

João Fernando de Almeida Prado ("Yan"; b. 8 December 1898; d. 23 October 1987), Brazilian historian and essayist. Born in Rio Claro in the state of São Paulo, Prado studied music and composition in Paris and Italy under several teachers, and took a degree at the São Paulo Law School. He also participated in the Brazilian modernist movement of the 1920s, an aesthetic and cultural reaction against European cultural dominance. Between 1928 and 1938 he wrote for major newspapers and literary magazines, among them O Estado do São Paulo, Diário da Noite, and Correio da Manhã; the literary magazines Klaxon and Antropofagia; and foreign publications such as Recueil Sirey and Revue de synthèse.

Prado was a lifelong student of Brazilian colonial history, one of the first to systematically study that era. His many published works, considered obligatory for students of colonial Brazil, are known primarily for their inclusion of important documents from the period. In the course of his life Prado amassed an enormous and important collection of Braziliana, including many rare books written by European travelers in Brazil. This collection as well as his personal library of 30,000 volumes are now housed at São Paulo University's Instituto de Estudos Brasileiros (Brazilian Studies Institute).

Prado's works include Primeiros povoadores do Brasil (1935); Pernambuco e as capitanias do norte do Brasil (1939); O Brasil e o colonialismo europeu (1955); A Bahia e as capitanias do centro do Brasil (1964); Historia da formação da sociedade brasileira: D. João VI e o início da classe dirigente do Brasil (1968).

See alsoBrazil: The Colonial Era, 1500–1808; Modernism, Brazil.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Camargos, Marcia. Semana de 22: Entre vaias e aplausos. São Paulo: Boitempo, 2002.

Pesavento, Sandra Jatahy. Escrita, linguagem, objetos: Leituras de história cultural. Bauru, SP, Brazil: Editora da Universidade do Sagrado Coração, 2004.

                                          Brian Owensby