1857-1913
Aluísio Azevedo (born Aluísio Tancredo Gonçalves de Azevedo) is primarily known today as a "Brazilian novelist." He was, in life, far more--even including diplomatic work. He was born on this day in Sao Luis in the Brazilian state of Maranhao. If his last name rings a bell, that might be because he is the younger brother of Artur Azevedo, the Brazilian playwright who is much more well known. Aluísio, in addition to being a writer of poetry, prose and plays, was also a gifted caricaturist. Drawing and painting were his first love, and he began both as a child. As a young adult, moved for a time to Rio, the adopted home of his older brother to study and graduate from art school, but returned to Sao Luis upon the death of his father to care for his remaining family--this is when he took up writing. His first published work was put out in 1880, a novel in the romantic genre. He then set about working toward the founding of an anti-clerical journal and wrote many articles on the abolition of slavery for it. His most famous work, and the source used first in motion pictures, was published in 1881. The novel O Mulato dealt with racism in various forms, including minor themes on native issues and the plight of caboclo individuals in the local state--but mostly it was a polemic on local racism against mixed race and African descended peoples. The publishing of the this work gave him enough income to free up his return to Rio. There he lived solely as a writer until 1895, when he was called upon for diplomatic duties. During his time as a diplomat, he served in a very wide variety of countries ranging from Spain to Japan; his life ending up as a Brazilian minister in Argentina where he died on the 21st of January in Buenos Aires at the relatively young age of 55. I can find no information on his burial. The first film made from his work came just five years later in his native Brazil. O Cruzeiro do Sul (1917) was based on his greatest work O Mulato and was directed by Italian ex-pat Vittorio Capellaro; it was the only silent film made of his work. It would be 23 years before his work was used again for a film and that came in the form of a short: O Madeireiro; with the first feature length sound film coming in 1945 with O Cortiço. His material made it's television debut in 1952 with the Brazilian series Casa de Pensao; while the most recent use of his work came in 2011 with The Lumberman, a Brazilian television short film. To my knowledge, no use of his work outside of Brazil has been made to this date.
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