born Jan. 28, 1800, Lisbon
died June 18, 1875, Lisbon
Portuguese poet.
Though blind from childhood, he became a classical scholar and by age 16 was publishing poems, translations, and pedagogical works. With his Obras completas (1837; "Complete Works"), he became a literary figure in Lisbon. As director of the important journal O panorama and later of the major cultural review Revista universal Lisbonense , he became a central figure in the Portuguese Romantic movement. After 1850 he gradually returned to a genteel traditionalism. His lifeless style so dominated literary taste that it provoked a rebellion by younger writers, and he was dethroned as literary arbiter.