GUERRA JUNQUEIRO, ABILIO MANUEL. - Portuguese poet, b. at Freixo-de Espada-à-Cinta on 17 Sept. 1850, d. at Lisbon on 7 July 1923. He combined literary activity with politics (he was a deputy in various legislatures and Portugal’s minister in Berne), but disappointments led him to withdraw to one of his estates, where he also occupied himself with radio-biology.
His colourful and sonorous output exemplarily represents the rebellious and social poetry of the late nineteenth century. He was against the Church, against the monarchy, against Romantic conventions. Irreverent even in its title is Velhice do Padre Eterno (1885), repudiated by the author in 1921 and described as “abominable”; pantheistic are Orapão ao Pão (1902) and Orapão à Luz (1903). In his last years he underwent a religious evolution, which did not, however, lead to reconciliation with the Church; he nevertheless desired a Catholic burial and an image of St Francis of Assisi upon his coffin. Among other works, he wrote: A morte de dom João (1874), Finii patriae (1890), Os simples (1892); Patria (1896).