António Jacinto

António Jacinto, full name António Jacinto do Amaral Martins, born in Luanda, Angola 28 September 1924, died 23 June 1991 in Lisbon, Portugal, was an Angolan poet.

Biography

After having obtained his license in Luanda, he started working as a civil servant. He stood out as a protesting poet, and as a result of his political militancy, was arrested and sent to the Tarrafal concentration camp in Cape Verde from 1960 to 1972. He was then transferred to Lisbon where, on parole, he worked as an accountant. He escaped in 1973 to join the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola. As soon as independence was declared in 1975 and until 1978, he carried out the function of Minister of Education and Cultural Secretary of State.

Bibliography

• António Jacinto, Poems, 1961, Éditions Casa dos Estudantes do Império, Lisbon.
• António Jacinto, Outra vez Vovô Bartolomeu (Portuguese, Another time Grandfather Bartolomeu), 1979.
• António Jacinto, Survivre dans Tarrafal de Santiago (French, Surviving in Tarrafal de Santiago), Éditions INALD (Instituto Nacional do Livro de Disco), 1985, Luanda.

Selected poems

• O grande desafio (Portuguese, The great challenge)
• Poema da alienação (Poem of alienation)
• Carta dum contratado (Letter of a contract worker)
• Monangamba (French adaptation and music setting by Colette Magny in 1964)
• Canto interior de uma noite fantástica (Interior chant of a fantastic night)
• Era uma vez (literally, it was once; can be translated as, once upon a time)
• Bailarina negra (Black dancer)
• Ah! Se pudésseis aqui ver poesia que não há! (Ah! If you could see that there is no poetry here!)

Quotes

• Sur cette vaste plantation, ce n'est pas la pluie mais la sueur de mon front qui arrose les récoltes (French, from poem "Monangamba"; literally, On this vast plantation, it is not rain but the sweat from my brow that waters the harvests)

External links

• Biográfia e poemas de António Jacinto