Romero, Sílvio (1851–1914)

Sílvio Romero (b. 21 April 1851; d. 18 June 1914), Brazilian critic and historian of literature. Silvio Vasconcelos da Silveira Ramos Romero was born in Lagarto, Sergipe, and began his intellectual life in Recife, Pernambuco, where he was the leader, with Tobias Barreto, of the Escola de Recife, a group advocating a change from romanticism to realism. Romero criticized Antônio Federico de Castro Alves, one of the most important Brazilian romantic poets; he debated Joaquin Maria Machado De Assis, the great novelist of realism; and he opposed José Veríssimo, who studied Brazilian literature from the artistic point of view. Romero followed the sociological method in his literary criticism and was one of the most significant members of the Brazilian naturalistic movement, searching in social life for the source of literary creation.

Romero's books include Cantos do fim do século (1878), poetry; Introdução à história da literatura brasileira (1882) and Estudos de literatura contemporãnea (1885), criticism; Contos populares do Brasil (1883) and Estudos sobre a poesia popular no Brasil (1888), folklore; and Doutrina contra doutrina: O evolucionismo e o positivismo no Brasil (1894) and As oligarquias e sua classificação (1908), sociological meditation. His most important book as a critic is História da literatura brasileira (1888), the first systematization of Brazilian literature. He died in Rio de Janeiro, where he had lived since 1876.

See alsoLiterature: Brazil .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Antônio Cândido De Melo E Souza, Introdução ao método crítico de Sílvio Romero (1945).

Ari Machado Guimarães, Sílvio Romero (1951).

Additional Bibliography

Matos, Cláudia. A poesia popular na república das letras: Sílvio Romero folclorista. Rio de Janeiro: Editora UFRJ, 1994.

Mota, Maria Aparecida Rezende. Sílvio Romero: Dilemmas e combates no Brasil da virada do século XX. Rio de Janeiro: FGV Editora, 2000.

                     Eliana Maria Rea Goldschmidt