Paulo Leminski

Paulo Leminski Filho (August 24, 1944 – June 7, 1989) was a Brazilian writer, poet, translator, journalist, advertising professional, songwriter, literary critic, biographer, teacher and judoka.

He was noted for his avant-garde work, an experimental novel and poetry inspired in concrete poetry, as well as abundant short lyrics derived from haiku and related forms.

He had a remarkable poetry, as he invented his own way of writing, with puns, jokes with popular sayings and the influence of haiku, in addition to abusing slangs and profanity.

Leminski was born in Curitiba, in the Brazilian state of Paraná, in 1944.

His father, Paulo Leminski, was of Polish descent, and his mother, Áurea Pereira Mendes, was of Portuguese, Afro-Brazilian and indigenous descent.

In 1958, Leminski was sent to the Mosteiro de São Bento in São Paulo, where he stayed for a year.

There he studied latin, theology, philosophy and classic literature.

Leminski wanted to be a monk, being against his father's wishes, who wanted his son to become a serviceman like him.

Leminski abandoned his religious vocations in 1963.

During the First Congress of Brazilian Experimental Poetry in Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, he met Haroldo de Campos, who would become one of his long-time friends and major influences.

In 1963 he officially married Nevair "Neiva" Maria de Sousa, a plastic artist.

In 1964 he published his first poems in the arts journal Invenção, founded by Décio Pignatari, Haroldo de Campos and his brother Augusto.

In 1965 he became a history and creative writing teacher, even though he had never finished college.

He became the most famous teacher in Curitiba because of his way of teaching.

This experience motivated him to write his book Catatau.

He was also an expert judo sensei.

They divorced in 1968.

In 1968 he married for the second time, this time with fellow poet Alice Ruiz.

They had three children: Miguel Ângelo (who died prematurely due to a lymphoma), Aurea Alice and Estrela Leminski, who would also become a poet, artist and musician.

He moved temporarily to Rio de Janeiro in 1969, returning to Curitiba in the following year.

In 1970 he published in various magazines, such as Qorpo Estranho, Muda Código and Raposa.

In the late 1970s, in the publishing house Grafipar, located in Curitiba, Alice and Leminski scripted erotic comic books, drawn by artists such as Claudio Seto, Júlio Shimamoto, Flávio Colin and Itamar Gonçalves.

Leminski was a polyglot; he knew French, English, Spanish, Japanese, Latin and Greek.

In 1975, his first romance and major work, Catatau, was published.

It took 8 years to be completely written.

In 1976 he published a photo-book in partnership with the photographer Jack Pires called Quarenta clics em Curitiba.

It consists of 40 black-and-white photographs and 40 poems.

In 1988, after a 20-year marriage, Leminski divorced Alice Ruiz, with whom he was working on his last poetry book, the exquisite La vie en close, which appeared posthumously in 1991.

Leminski died on June 7, 1989, of liver cirrhosis, from which he had suffered for years.

Leminski had many musical partners in life such as Moraes Moreira, Itamar Assumpção, Ivo Rodrigues and Guilherme Arantes.

His compositions have been sung by artists such as Caetano Veloso, Ney Matogrosso, the group A Cor do Som, Paulinho Boca de Cantor, Zizi Possi, Zélia Duncan, Gilberto Gil, Ângela Maria, Ná Ozzetti, Arnaldo Antunes and Vítor Ramil.

Gilberto Gil honored one of Leminski's daughters with the song Estrela.

Estrela Leminski had published in 2014 an album called Leminskanções with 25 songs composed by her father and one song book, registering around 109 compositions by Leminski.

Leminski was a trotskyist and was close to the Organização Socialista Internacionalista, a trotskyist organization put in the situation of clandestinity by the Brazilian military dictatorship.

In a poem dedicated to the Liberdade e Luta organization (Libelu), an organization formed in the University of São Paulo to combat the military dictatorship, he wrote that the "trotskyists were the ones power did not corrupt".

Leminski had a major Japanese influence through his life and writing, such as Zen Buddhism, haiku, and judo.

A vanguardist poet, Leminski is also considered a poeta marginal ("marginal poet") for his extensive publications in magazines and fanzines.

He has influenced all Brazilian literary movements in the last 30 years.

It is an experimental novel, written in prose poetry, dealing with an imaginary visit of philosopher René Descartes to Brazil alongside Prince John Maurice of Nassau during the Dutch invasions of Brazil in the 17th century.

Catatau would draw the attention of some of the most important cultural personalities of the time, such as Caetano Veloso, Gilberto Gil, Tom Zé and Moraes Moreira.