To mark the bicentenary of the birth of Camilo Castelo Branco (1825-2025), CTT Correios de Portugal has decided to issue a collection of stamps and the book Lugares da Vida e da Ficcao em Camilo Castelo Branco (Places in the Life and Fiction of Camilo Castelo Branco), by José Manuel de Oliveira.
I have written about the writer in my articles published here: Monument and here Camilo Castelo Branco w filatelistyce, here stamps commemorating his 100th birth anniversary are shown.
The souvenir sheet' stamp
depicts the novelist at the house in Sao Miguel de Seide, in the study of
which, from 1863, he installed his Foundry of Letters, transforming it into one
of the greatest altars of Portuguese literature. The scarf that continues across
the sheet alludes to his literary production, which comprises 137 titles,
corresponding to 180 volumes. The vine, a symbol of life, is a metaphor for the
vitality and topicality of his texts.
The remaining stamps portray
four works that highlight the beauty of the genius's prose and his inimitable
flair for stirring up emotions, as well as demonstrating the enduring nature of
Camilo-esque syntheses of human vulnerability.
In his masterpiece Amor de
Perdição (Doomed Love), we find thwarted loves, unrequited passions and
consequent martyrdoms; love forbidden by family or social convention, cultural
differences, financial interests and rivalries; and the pain caused by solitude
and being kept apart from a lover, such as when Teresa is sent to a convent and
Simao is imprisoned, as well as the weight of these circumstances on the mental
health of those in love.
In Maria Moisés, the novelist
explores the prejudice surrounding relationships between young people with
different social statuses, a topic just as relevant today in other amorous
contexts: people of the same sex, of different races and religious beliefs. It
exposes the reality and consequences of a teenage pregnancy for both family and
community; it describes the serious risks of unattended births for mother and
baby; and it highlights the importance of showing solidarity and charity
towards abandoned or unprotected children.
The character of Calisto Elói,
in A Queda dum Anjo (The Fall of an Angel) embodies certain politicians who, in
the lead up to elections, are instilled with the loftiest ideals and the
noblest projects and, once elected, shed, almost without thinking, the ethical
values that should guide them; their parliamentary interventions becoming
"virtuous nonsense"; and their mission of public service merely
contributing to the country's decay, because real transformation and
modernisation are thwarted by the superficiality of any measures taken and the
paltry results achieved.
Memórias do Carcere (Memories
of Prison) is a fictional and historical document about the conditions of
nineteenth-century prisons and a certain ignominy within the wheels of justice;
penal frameworks stitched together in a way that hinders the application of
punishments; financial incentives within the judicial mechanism; the granting
of liberties to some but not all; the different treatment given to those with
assets compared to the poor and humble; not to mention the precarious
conditions in jails and the overcrowding of cells. A writer and four books: a
small library by one of the greatest prodigies of Portuguese literature, who
scrutinised, interpreted and shaped, with supreme aesthetic quality, some of
the stigmas that best define and characterise the Portuguese way of living and
being.
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