Joaquim Machado de Assis was a Brazilian writer, born in Rio de Janeiro in 1839, considered a renowned writer, journalist, chronicler, playwright and poet of Brazilian literature, being the greatest black writer of all times.
Did you know that Machado de Assis was the son of a father descending from a black man and that his mother may have been an Azorean?
Maria Leopoldina Machado was the name of Machado de Assis’ mother, who many scholars claim was a black slave. However, there is information that proves the opposite, stating that Machado de Assis’ mother was white, from the Azores, being considered a free worker, since the Azoreans, in Brazil, served to replace the lack of labour in the plantations.
According to the article “A Mãe de Machado de Assis, Maria Leopoldina da Câmara”, written by Tim Marvim, available online at: http://machadodeassis-memorialdobruxo.blogspot.com/2009/07/maria-leopoldina-machado-da-camara-mae.html, it is believed that Maria Leopoldina arrived in Brazil in a slave ship that, certainly, called in the Azores and transported waves of Azorean emigrants in the first decades of the 19th century. It is important to mention that, at that time, the slave trade was no longer so fluent, due to the impositions placed by the English, so it was possible to transport other emigrants, in this case Azoreans in slave ships, although they were in terrible conditions. Thus, the author of the article affirms that Machado de Assis may have been the son of an Azorean woman.
Last modified: 2 de February, 2022
