Colonial poetry and historical process: na introduction to Cláudio Manuel da Costa

Abstract

This paper seeks to examine Cláudio Manuel da Costa’s poetics based on its historical determinations and the way these are incorporated into the way his poetry is crafted as lines of force.We consider a few key themes, such as the figuration of the mining activity and its implications for a wider process of primitive accumulation of capital;the creation of a world system that drives the globalization of culture and the feeling of dismay, transposed into literary form, between reality created based on literary convention and objective historical reality. The balance is poetry of convention that bears specific marks, whichresults in an elaborate poetic that problematizes the march of history.

Keywords: Arcadian poetry; historical progress; artistic formalization.