Antonio de Castro Alves werd geboren op 14 maart 1847 in Curralinho (in 1900 kreeg dit dorp overigens de naam "Castro Alves"), in de Braziliaanse provincie Bahia, als zoon van Antônio José Alves, een arts, en Clélia Brasília da Silva Castro, dochter van José Antônio da Silva Castro (a.k.a. "Periquitão"), een prominent figuur tijdens het beleg van Salvodor, 1821-1823.
In 1853 werd hij op kostschool gestuurd in Sebrao. In 1862 verhuisde hij naar Recife om aldaar te studeren aan het Faculdade de Direito do Recife, Om tot twee keer toe te zakken voor zijn toelatingsexamen. Pas in 1864 werd hij toegelaten. Aldaar ontmoette hij Tobias Barreto en José Bonifácio , die beide sterk beïnvloed zouden worden door Castro Alves. Zijn vader stierf in 1866. Kort daarna begon hij uit te gaan met de Braziliaanse actrice Eugênia Câmara, die overigens van Portugese afkomst was.
In 1867 keerde hij samen met zijn geliefde terug naar Bahia,alwaar hij begon te schrijven aan zijn drama Gonzaga, ou A Revolução de Minas. In het daaropvolgende jaar vertrokken ze naar São Paulo. Op het einde van 1868 werd zijn Gonzaga op het toneel gebracht. Het stuk kreeg veel positieve reacties, maar zijn gemoedtoestand werd enkel bepaald door de breuk met Eugenia.
Tijdens de jacht, eveneens in 1868, werd hij per ongeluk in zijn linkervoet geraakt, welke vervolgens geamputeerd diende te worden in verband met gangreen.
Het jaar 1870 bracht hij door in de provincie Bahia om te herstellen van Tuberculose dat hij naar alle waarschijnlijkheid gedurende zijn verblijf in Sao Paolo had opgelopen. (hoewel sommige bronnen aangeven dat er reeds op zijn zestiende TBC was geconstateerd)
In 1870 publiceerde Castro Alves zijn bundel Espumas Flutuantes — het enige werk dat gedurende zijn leven gepubliceerd werd. Zijn strijd tegen de TBC bleek al snel een hopeloze te zijn en op 6 juli 1874 overleed hij dan ook op 24-jarige leeftijd te Salvador, Bahia.
werken :
Espumas Flutuantes (1870)
Gonzaga, ou A Revolução de Minas (1875)
A Cachoeira de Paulo Afonso (1876)
Vozes d'África (1880)
O Navio Negreiro (1880)
Os Escravos (1883)
Daarnaast vertaalde hij de werken van Hugo en Byron in het Portugees.
Veel van zijn gedichten hebben een sterke republikeins karakter en handelen vaak over zaken als slavernij. Hoewel sommige bronnen spreken van zijn grote rol in de uiteindelijke afschaffing van de slavernij, wordt die door anderen weer sterk tegen gesproken. Wat overigens niet wegneemt dat hij zijn mening in zijn gedichten nooit onder stoelen of banken heeft gestoken.
The Slave Ship
We are on the high seas... Mad in space
The moonlight plays — golden butterfly;
And the waves run after it. . . tire
Like a band of troubled infants.
We are on the high seas... From the firmament
The stars leap like spray of gold. . .
The sea in turn lights phosphorescence,
— Constellations of liquid treasure...
We are on the high seas... Two infinites
Strain there in a mad embrace
Blue, golden, placid, sublime..
Which of the two is ocean? Which sky?...
We are on the high seas.. . Opening the sails,
To the warm breath of the marine breezes,
Sailed brig run on the crests of the seas,
As the swallows brush in the wave...
Whence do you come? Wither do you go? Of the erring ships
Who knows the course if the space is so great?
On this Sahara the coursers raise dust,
Gallop, soar, but leave no trace.
Happy he who can, there, at fhis hour,
Feel this panel's magesty!.. .
Below — the sea... above — the firmament! ...
And in the sea and in the sky — the immensity!
Oh! what sweet harmony the breeze brings me!
What soft music sounds far off!
My God! how sublime an ardent song is
Floating at random on the endless waves!
Men of the sea! Oh rude mariners,
Toasfed by the sun of the four worlds!
Children whom the tempests warmed
In the cradle of these profound abysses!
Wait! ... wait! ... let me drink
This savage, free poetry.. .
Orchestra — is the sea, which roars by the prow
And the wind, which whistles in the ropes.
Why do you flee thus, swift barque?
Why do you flee the fearless poet?
Would that I could accompany the furrow
You sow in the sea — mad comet!
Albatroz! Albatroz! Eagle of the ocean,
You who sleep in the gauze of the clouds,
Shake your feathers, leviathan of space
Albatroz! Albatroz! give me those wings.
II
What does the sailor's cradle matter,
Or where he is the son, where his home?
He loves the cadence of the verse
Which is faught him by the old sea!
Sing! Death is divine!
The brig slips on the bowline — Like a swift dolphin.
Fast to the mizzen mast
The nostalgic flag points
To the waves it leaves behind.
From the Spanish, chants
Broken with languor,
They recall the dusky maidens
The Andalusians in flower!
From Italy the indolent son
Sings of sleeping Venice,
— Land of love and treachery,
Or from the gulf in its lap
Recalls the verses of Tasso
Close to the lava of the volcano.
The Englishman — cold mariner
Who from birth found himself at sea
(Because England is a ship,
Which God anchored in the Channel),
Stern, he intoans his countryls glories
Remembering, proudly, histories
Of Nelson and of Aboukir.
The Frenchman — predestined —
Sings of the triumphs of the past
And the laurels to come!
The Hellenic sailors,
Whom Ionian space created,
Beautiful dark pirates
From the sea that Ulysses cut,
Men that Phydias seulped,
Are singing in the clear night
Verses that Homer moaned...
Sailors from all lands,
Know how to find in the waves
The melodies of the skies!. . .
III
Descend from the immense space, oh eagle of the ocean,
Descend more... even more.. . human glance cannot
Like yours plunge into the flying brig!
But what is it I see there... What picture of bitterness
It’s funeral song! ... What tetric figures! ...
What an infamous vile scene!... My God! my God! What horror!
IV
It was a dantesque dream.. . the deck
Great lights redenning its brilliance,
Bathing it in blood.
Clang of irons. .. snap of whip ...
Legions of men black as the night
Horrible dancing...
Black women, holding to their breasts
Scrawny infants whose black mouths
Are watered by the blood of their mothers:
Others, young, but nude and frightened,
In the whirlwind of specters drawn
From anxiety and vane resentment!
And the orchestra laughs, ironic, strident...
And from the fantastic circle a serpent
Spirals madly...
If the old man cringes, slips to the ground,
You hear shouts... the whip cracks.
And they fligh more and more.
Prisoned in the bars of a single jail
The famished multitude shudders,
Aud weeps and dances!
One is delirious from rabies, another is going mad,
Another, bruttish from martyrdom
Sings, groans, and laughs!
Meantime the captain commands the maneuver
And after gazing at the sky which unfolds
So pure over the sea,
Cries out of the gloom of dense obscurity,
"Shake out the whip, mariners!
Make them dance, more!..."
And the orquestra laughs ironic, strident...
And from the fantastic circle a serpent
Spirals madly...
Like a dantesque dream the shadows fly!
Shouts, ahs, curses, embodied prayers!
And Satan laughs! ...
V
Lord God of the unfortunate!
Tell me Lord God!
If if is madness... or truth
So much horror under the skies?!...
Oh sea why do you not erase
With the sponge of the waves,
Your mantle, this blot?...
Stars! Nights! Tempests!
Roll down from the immensity!
Sweep the seas, typhoon!
Who are these unfortunates
Who do not find in you,
More than the calm laughter of the band
Which excitcs the torturers to fury?
Who are they? If the star hushes,
If the oppressive space slides by
Like a furtive accomplice,
Before the confused night
Say it severe Muse
Free, audacious Muse! ...
They are the sons of the desert,
Where the land espouses the light
Where in the open spaces lives
A tribe of nude men. . .
They are daring warriors
Who with the, spotted tigers
Combat in the solitude.
Yesterday simple, strong, brave...
Today miserable slaves,
Lacking air, light, reason.
They are disgraced women
Like Agar was also,
Who thirsty, weakened,
Come from far far off...
Bringiiig with tepid steps,
Children and irons on their arms,
In their souls — tears and gaul. . .
Like Agar suffering so much
That not even the milk of lament
Have they to give Ismael.
Off there on the limitless sands,
From the palms of the country,
They were born — beautiful children,
They lived — gentle maidens.. .
A caravan goes by one day
When the virgin in the cabin
Apprehensive from the veils of night
... Good-bye mountain hut,
... Good-bye palms of the fountain!
... Good-bye, loves... good-bye!
Afterwards, the extensive sands
Afterwards, the ocean of dust.
Afterwards, on the immense horizon
Deserts... deserts only...
And hunger, the tiredness, the thirst...
Oh how many unfortunates give up,
And fail to rise no more! ...
A place in the chain vacates,
But the jackal on the sand
Finds a body to gnaw.
Yesterday Sierra Leôa,
The war, the chase, the lion,
Sleep slept carelessly
Under the tents of amplitude!
Today the dark, deep hole
Infected, cramped, loathsome
Having the plague for a jaguar...
And sleep always broken
By death rattles
And the thud of corpses into the sea. . .
Yesterday full liberty,
Will for power...
Today... the peek of malice
They are not even free to die...
The same chain binds them
— Lugubrious iron snake —
In the threads of slavery.
And so humming of death,
The lugubrious cohort dances
To the sound of the lash ... Humiliation!. . .
Lord God of the unfortunate!
Tell me, Lord God,
Am I delirious... or is it truth
So much horror under the skies?! ...
Oh sea, why don't you crase
With the sponge of the waves,
Your mantle, this blot?
Stars! nights! tempests!
Roll down from the immensity
Sweep the seas, typhoon!
VI
A people exists that lends its flag
To cover so much infamy and cowardice!.
Transforming it in that feast
Into the impure mantle of a cold bacchante! ...
My God! my God! but what flag is this,
That impudent floats from the truck?
Silence, muse... weep, weep so much
That the standard may be washed, by your grief! ...
Green-gold pendant of my land,
That the breeze of Brazil caresses and unfurls
Standard that in the light of the sun encloses
Promises of divine hope...
You, who in the liberty after war,
Were hoisted by heroes on the lance,
Rather that you had been torn in battle
Than serve a people as a shrowd! ...
Atrocious fatality which overwhelms the mind
Extinguish this hour loathsome brig
The furrow that Columbus opened in the waves,
Like an iris in the depth of the seas!
But this is too much infamy! ... From the ethereal regions
Rise, heroes of the New World!
Andrada! Rip that pendant from the air!
Columbus! Close the portais of your seas!
Vertaling: DAVID BARNHART
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