Noemia de Sousa (Carolina Noémia Abranches de Sousa) was born on September 20, 1926, in the district of Catembe, Mozambique. Later, in 1951, she went into exile in Lisbon, due to political persecution suffered in her native country. At that time, she had already written her poetic work, published in 2001, in the book black blood.
The mother of Mozambican poets, who died on December 4, 2002 in Portugal, she produced texts of nationalist content, characterized by composition in free verse. In them, the female and black voice prevails, which strives to highlight African culture; but also to show the social problems of Mozambique.
Read too: Paulina Chiziane – Mozambican author whose works address the female universe
Summary about Noémia de Sousa
Mozambican poet Noémia de Sousa was born in 1926 and died in 2002.
Her poetry was written between 1948 and 1951, the year the writer went into exile in Portugal.
The author's texts are nationalist and bring a female and black voice.
your work black blood, from 2001, is the only book published by Noémia de Sousa.
Do not stop now... There's more after the advertising ;)
Biography of Noémia de Sousa
Noémia de Sousa (Carolina Noémia Abranches de Sousa) born on September 20, 1926, in Catembe, Mozambique. She lived in that district until she was six years old, when she went to live in Lourenço Marques (now Maputo). Before, however, at the age of four, she learned to read and write with her father, a civil servant who valued knowledge and literature.
At the age of eight, the poet lost her father. Her mother, then, had to support her six children alone. In addition to this loss, the girl also had to face racial prejudice. and, as the author herself reports in an interview, she was ridiculed by a white man for reading a book when she was about ten years old.
The fact that she was literate by her father was a differential in the author's life, because, at the time, black people in Mozambique did not have access to education.. And, although Noémia managed to get into a school, according to the writer herself, she was the only black person in the institution.
Later, at age sixteen, after working during the day, the writer studied at night at the Technical School, where she studied Commerce. Furthermore, she published her first poem — “Song fraternal” - at the Portuguese Youth Newspaper. He also wrote for the weekly the African Shout.
She signed her texts only with initials and ended up surprising those who discovered that she was the author. so your participation in the Youth Democratic Unity Movement (MUDJ), her friendships with certain intellectuals, in addition to her texts and thoughts considered subversive, led the author to be monitored by the International Police for the Defense of the State (PIDE).
That is why, in 1951, she exiled-if in Lisbon. Upon leaving Mozambique, she ended her career as a poet. However, in 1986, she wrote a poem in honor of Mozambican President Samora Machel (1933-1986), on his death, entitled October 19th.
Before, however, in 1962, she married the poet Gualter Soares, with whom she had a daughter. And, around 1964, fleeing the dictatorship in Portugal, she went to live in France, where she worked as a journalist.. But in 1973, she returned to Portugal and started working at the Reuters agency.
Although the author has no published books, her poetic texts were famous and disseminated through the publication of anthologies of Mozambican poetry. Thus, Noémia de Sousa, for her literary work and her ideas, was well known when died on December 4, 2002 in Lisbon.
Read too: Conceição Evaristo – considered a great exponent of contemporary literature
Characteristics of Noémia de Sousa's work
The poet Noémia de Sousa is considered the mother of Mozambican poets. Almost all of her poems, with the exception of one, were written in just three years, from 1948 to 1951. And they have the following characteristics:
Free verses.
Nationalist aspect.
Sociopolitical criticism.
Prevalence of female voice.
Affirmation of blackness.
Exaltation of African culture.
Traits of the narrative genre.
Intimate and memorialistic character.
Strong emotionality.
Nostalgic elements.
Abundant adjectivation and exclamation.
Recurrent use of anaphora and alliteration.
Presence of parataxis and apostrophe.
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Themes:
childhood;
hope;
injustice;
oppression;
everyday of the suburb.
Works by Noémia de Sousa
black blood it's the Noémia de Sousa's only book, published in 2001, by the Association of Mozambican Writers. Between the poems in this publication, the following deserve mention:
“Our voice”.
"Supplication".
“If you want to meet me”.
“Let my people pass”.
“Black”.
"Samba".
"Man died in the land of cotton."
“Poem of John”.
“Poem to Jorge Amado”.
"Black Blood".
“I want to meet you Africa”.
See too: The best poems by Mia Couto
Poems by Noémia de Sousa
in the poem “If you want to meet me”, written in 1949, the poetic voice tells its interlocutor — possibly, the reader — what he must do to know and understand the I lyric, what is compared to a “black stick” carved and worked by a brother of the Maconde ethnic group.
The sculpture is described in this way — eye sockets empty of despair, mouth torn by anguish, large hands, body with visible and invisible wounds caused by slavery, tortured, haughty and mystical — in order to blend in with Africa itself, characterized by the “groans of the blacks on the docks”, drums, rebellion, melancholy and hope:
If you want to meet me,
study with eyes good to see
this black stick
that an unknown brother maconde
of inspired hands
cut and worked
in distant lands in the North.
Ah, this is me:
empty eye sockets in despair of possessing life,
mouth torn in anguish wounds,
huge, splayed hands,
rising in the manner of one who begs and threatens,
tattooed body of visible and invisible wounds
by the whips of slavery…
Tortured and magnificent,
haughty and mystical,
Africa from head to toe,
— oh, that's me:
if you want to understand me
come bent over my African soul,
in the moans of the blacks on the pier
in the frantic drumming of the muchopes
in the rebellion of the machananas
in the strange melancholy evolving
of a native song, late into the night...
And don't ask me anymore,
if you want to meet me...
That I'm nothing more than a meat whelk,
where the revolt of Africa froze
her swollen cry of hope.
Already in the poem “Sangue Negro”, also from 1949, the lyrical self directsif à Africa, which he calls “my Mother”. And he talks about the period when he was emotionally distant from her. The female lyrical self asks for forgiveness from Mother Africa for having remained aloof and recognizes that, in his soul, his black and African blood “is stronger than anything”:
O my mysterious and natural Africa,
my raped virgin,
my mom!
As I had been exiled for so long,
from you oblivious
distant and self-centered
through these city streets!
pregnant with foreigners
My Mother, forgive!
As if I could live like this,
in this way, forever,
ignoring the caress fraternally
warm from your moonlight
(my beginning and my end)...
As if it didn't exist beyond
from cinemas and cafes, anxiety
of your strange horizons, to unravel...
As if in your thickets
did not sing their freedom in mute,
the most beautiful birds, whose names are still closed mysteries!
[...]
To your maddened daughter,
open up and forgive!
[...]
mother my mother africa
of slave songs to moonlight,
can't, can't repudiate
the black blood, the barbarian blood you left me...
Because in me, in my soul, in my nerves,
he is stronger than anything,
I live, I suffer, I laugh through him, Mother!
Image credit
[1] Kapulana Publisher (reproduction)
by Warley Souza
Literature teacher
