DEUS

deus, joao de (1830-1896), the greatest portuguese poet of his generation, was born at san bartholomeu de messines in the province of algarve on the 8th of march 1830. matriculating in the faculty of law at the university of coimbra, he did not proceed to his degree but settled in the city, dedicating himself wholly to the composition of verses, which circulated among professors and undergraduates in manuscript copies. in the volume of his art, as in the conduct of life, he practised a rigorous self-control. he printed nothing previous to 1855, and the first of his poems to appear in a separate form was _la lata_, in 1860. in 1862 he left coimbra for beja, where he was appointed editor of _o bejense_, the chief newspaper in the province of alemtejo, and four years later he edited the _folha do sul_. as the pungent satirical verses entitled _eleicoes_ prove, he was not an ardent politician, and, though he was returned as liberal deputy for the constituency of silves in 1869, he acted independently of all political parties and promptly resigned his mandate. the renunciation implied in the act, which cut him off from all advancement, is in accord with nearly all that is known of his lofty character. in the year of his election as deputy, his friend jose antonio garcia blanco collected from local journals the series of poems, _flores do campo_, which is supplemented by the _ramo de flores_ (1869). this is joao de deus's masterpiece. _pires de marmalada_ (1869) is an improvisation of no great merit. the four theatrical pieces--_amemos o nosso proximo_, _ser apresentado_, _ensaio de casamento_, and _a viuva inconsolavel_--are prose translations from mery, cleverly done, but not worth the doing. _horacio e lydia_ (1872), a translation from ronsard, is a good example of artifice in manipulating that dangerously monotonous measure, the portuguese couplet. as an indication of a strong spiritual reaction three prose fragments (1873)--_anna, mae de maria_, _a virgem maria_ and _a mulher do levita de ephrain_--translated from darboy's _femmes de la bible_, are full of significance. the _folhas soltas_ (1876) is a collection of verse in the manner of _flores do campo_, brilliantly effective and exquisitely refined. within the next few years the writer turned his attention to educational problems, and in his _cartilha maternal_ (1876) first expressed the conclusions to which his study of pestalozzi and frobel had led him. this patriotic, pedagogical apostolate was a misfortune for portuguese literature; his educational mission absorbed joao de deus completely, and is responsible for numerous controversial letters, for a translation of theodore-henri barrau's treatise, _des devoirs des enfants envers leurs parents_, for a prosodic dictionary and for many other publications of no literary value. a copy of verses in antonio vieira's _grinalda de maria_ (1877), the _loas a virgem_ (1878) and the _proverbios de salomao_ are evidence of a complete return to orthodoxy during the poet's last years. by a lamentable error of judgment some worthless pornographic verses entitled _cryptinas_ have been inserted in the completest edition of joao de deus's poems--_campo de flores_ (lisbon, 1893). he died at lisbon on the 11th of january 1896, was accorded a public funeral and was buried in the national pantheon, the jeronymite church at belem, where repose the remains of camoens, herculano and garrett. his scattered minor prose writings and correspondence have been posthumously published by dr theophilo braga (lisbon, 1898). next to camoens and perhaps garrett, no portuguese poet has been more widely read, more profoundly admired than joao de deus; yet no poet in any country has been more indifferent to public opinion and more deliberately careless of personal fame. he is not responsible for any single edition of his poems, which were put together by pious but ill-informed enthusiasts, who ascribed to him verses that he had not written; he kept no copies of his compositions, seldom troubled to write them himself, and was content for the most part to dictate them to others. he has no great intellectual force, no philosophic doctrine, is limited in theme as in outlook, is curiously uncertain in his touch, often marring a fine poem with a slovenly rhyme or with a misplaced accent; and, on the only occasion when he was induced to revise a set of proofs, his alterations were nearly all for the worse. and yet, though he never appealed to the patriotic spirit, though he wrote nothing at all comparable in force or majesty to the restrained splendour of _os lusiadas_, the popular instinct which links his name with that of his great predecessor is eminently just. for camoens was his model; not the camoens of the epic, but the camoens of the lyrics and the sonnets, where the passion of tenderness finds its supreme utterance. braga has noted five stages of development in joao de deus's artistic life--the imitative, the idyllic, the lyric, the pessimistic and the devout phases. under each of these divisions is included much that is of extreme interest, especially to contemporaries who have passed through the same succession of emotional experience, and it is highly probable that _caturras_ and _gaspar_, pieces as witty as anything in bocage but free from bocage's coarse impiety, will always interest literary students. but it is as the singer of love that joao de deus will delight posterity as he delighted his own generation. the elegiac music of _rachel_ and of _marina_, the melancholy of _adeus_ and of _remoinho_, the tenderness and sincerity of _meu casta lirio_, of _lagrima celeste_, of _descalca_ and a score more songs are distinguished by the large, vital simplicity which withstands time. it is precisely in the quality of unstudied simplicity that joao de deus is incomparably strong. the temptations to a display of virtuosity are almost irresistible for a portuguese poet; he has the tradition of virtuosity in his blood, he has before him the example of all contemporaries, and he has at hand an instrument of wonderful sonority and compass. yet not once is joao de deus clamorous or rhetorical, not once does he indulge in idle ornament. his prevailing note is that of exquisite sweetness and of reverent purity; yet with all his caressing softness he is never sentimental, and, though he has not the strength for a long fight, emotion has seldom been set to more delicate music. had he included among his other gifts the gift of selection, had he continued the poetic discipline of his youth instead of dedicating his powers to a task which, well as he performed it, might have been done no less well by a much lesser man, there is scarcely any height to which he might not have risen. see also maxime formont, _le mouvement poetique contemporain en portugal_ (lyon, 1892). (j. f.-k.)