A tragédia nova e o drama histórico de Garrett: repensando Frei Luís de Sousa (1843-1844) e A Sobrinha do Marquês (1848)

Abstract

The nineteenth-century polygraph and precursor of Portuguese Romanticism, Almeida Garrett distinguished himself through his profound dedication to the theater. Within this artistic realm, he worked on various fronts and was responsable for reforming the Portuguese theatrical landscape. Thus, this present study aims to highlight Garrett's ideas that fueled this productive endeavor and subsequently analyzes two of his dramatic compositions. Garrett was a theater critic with a vast historical and literary culture, cultivated since childhood through classial education, as can be observed is some of the prefaces to his worlks. A careful reading of Frei Luís de Sousa (1843-1844) and A Sobrinha do Marquês (1848), both published during the Cabralist dictatorship, reveals the foundations of Garrett's dramatic activity and allows us to address the designations "modern tragedy" and "historical comedy/drama" proposed by the author. The first drama evokes the seventeenth-century monastic Manuel de Sousa Coutinho and the consequences of the Battle of Alcácer-Quibir. The second drama is set at the end of the reign of D. José and the ministry of the Marquês de Pombal. The study of A Sobrinha do Marquês is complemented by an analysis of its manuscript and Almeida Garrett's dramatic craftsmanship