Camafeus romanos.

Lisbon, Porto & Coimbra, Lumen, 1921.. First Edition. 8°, original printed wrappers (slightly soiled and with 2 small holes on spine). Title page printed in red and black. Finely printed on high quality paper. Minor stains. Overall in good to very good condition. 92 pp., (2 ll.). *** FIRST EDITION. The poet, diplomat and university professor Eugénio de Castro (Eugénio de Castro e Almeida, 1869-1944) introduced Symbolism to Portugal; as a young diplomat in Paris he came into contact with the great French symbolist poets, becoming a friend of Jean Moréas and Henri de Régnier. His influence can be seen even on such established Portuguese writers as Guerra Junqueiro, and he undoubtedly paved the way for Camilo Pessanha and Mário Sá Carneiro. Castro's verse ("often so perfect, always so artificial," says Bell, Portuguese Literature p. 337) signaled the return to poetry of careful thought and planning, as opposed to the inspired improvisation of the Romanticists, and led to the cult of "art for art's sake" or "estheticism" that became prominent in Portugal ca. 1925.*** Fonseca, Aditamentos p. 124: citing the imprint as Porto, Typ. Lusitana (from the colophon rather than the title page). On Eugénio de Castro, see also Saraiva & Lopes, História da literatura portuguesa (17th ed., 2001), pp. 479, 669, 914, 975–6, 986 and 998; Grande enciclopedia VI, 235-7; Etalvina Santos in Machado, ed., Dicionário de literatura portuguesa, pp. 119–21; Fernando Guimarães in Biblos, I, 1074–6; and Dicionário cronológico de autores portugueses, III, 85–7.