Olegário Mariano

Genres

poetry

Biography

Olegário Mariano Carneiro da Cunha was born in Recife on March 24, 1889, standing out in Brazil's cultural history not only as a politician and diplomat, but mainly as a renowned poet. The son of prominent figures in the abolitionist and republican movements in Pernambuco, he built a multifaceted career that included positions in diplomacy, public administration, and the Brazilian Academy of Letters, where he occupied chair 21.

In addition to his literary and public activities, his poetic work found strong resonance in Brazilian popular music, with several of his poems set to music and recorded by important performers of our culture. He became widely known as the "poet of the cicadas" due to one of his most recurring themes and also used the pseudonym João da Avenida to sign humorous verse chronicles in periodicals of the time.

His relevance in the national literary and artistic scene was crowned in 1938, when he was elected Prince of Brazilian Poets in a contest promoted by the magazine Fon-Fon, succeeding Alberto de Oliveira. Connected to great names in national literature such as his cousin Manuel Bandeira and the Parnassian Olavo Bilac, Olegário Mariano died in Rio de Janeiro on November 28, 1958, leaving an indelible legacy in Brazilian poetry.