page_title: Machado de Assis
hierarchical_section_title: Machado de Assis
caption_attribution_description: Português: Fundo Correio da Manhã.
context_page_description: Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis, often known by his surnames as Machado de Assis, Machado, or Bruxo do Cosme Velho, was a pioneer Brazilian novelist, poet, playwright and short story writer, widely regarded as the greatest writer of Brazilian literature. Nevertheless, Assis did not achieve widespread popularity outside Brazil during his lifetime. In 1897 he founded and became the first President of the Brazilian Academy of Letters. He was multilingual, having taught himself French, English, German and Greek in later life.
  Born in Morro do Livramento, Rio de Janeiro, a mulatto from a poor family, he barely studied in public schools and never attended university. He struggled to rise socially, supplying himself with intellectual superiority and cultural capital. To do so, he took several public positions, passing through the Ministry of Agriculture, Trade and Public Works, and achieving early notoriety in newspapers where he published his first poetry and chronicles.
  Machado's works had a great influence on Brazilian literary schools of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
context_section_description: Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis (Portuguese: [ʒwɐˈkĩ mɐˈɾi.ɐ mɐˈʃadu dʒi ɐˈsis]), often known by his surnames as Machado de Assis, Machado, or Bruxo do Cosme Velho (21 June 1839 – 29 September 1908), was a pioneer Brazilian novelist, poet, playwright and short story writer, widely regarded as the greatest writer of Brazilian literature. Nevertheless, Assis did not achieve widespread popularity outside Brazil during his lifetime. In 1897 he founded and became the first President of the Brazilian Academy of Letters. He was multilingual, having taught himself French, English, German and Greek in later life.
  Born in Morro do Livramento, Rio de Janeiro, a mulatto from a poor family, he barely studied in public schools and never attended university. He struggled to rise socially, supplying himself with intellectual superiority and cultural capital. To do so, he took several public positions, passing through the Ministry of Agriculture, Trade and Public Works, and achieving early notoriety in newspapers where he published his first poetry and chronicles. 
  Machado's works had a great influence on Brazilian literary schools of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In 1941, the Brazilian Academy of Letters founded in his honor the Prêmio Machado de Assis (Machado de Assis Award), the most prestigious literary award in the country. For his innovation and audacity in early themes, Assis is often seen as a writer of unprecedented production, known for his irony and wide vocabulary. Assis' greatest works are Dom Casmurro (1899), Memórias Póstumas de Brás Cubas ("Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas", also translated as Epitaph of a Small Winner) and Quincas Borba (also known in English as Philosopher or Dog?). Machado de Assis was included on American literary critic Harold Bloom's list of the greatest 100 geniuses of literature. Bloom considers him the greatest black writer in Western literature.
caption: Machado de Assis in 1904.
   Brazilian National Archives
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