Early in the i8th century an attempt at the restoration of the drama by authors sprung from the people was made at the theatres of the Bairro Alto and Mouraria, and the numerous pieces staged there belong to low comedy. The Operas portuguezas of Antonio Jose da Silva (q.v.), produced between 1733 and 1741, owe their name to the fact that arias, minuets and modinhas were inter spersed with the prose dialogue, and if neither the plots, style nor language are remarkable, they have a real comic force and a certain originality. Like Silva's operas, the comedies of Nicolao Luiz contain a faithful picture of contemporary society; but ex cept in Os Maridos Peraltas, his characters are lifeless and their conventional passions are expressed in inflated language. Not withstanding their demerits, however, his comedies held the stage from 176o until the end of the century.
Meanwhile the Arcadia also took up the task of raising the tone of the stage, but though the ancients and the classic writers of the 16th century were its ideals, it drew immediate inspiration from the contemporary French theatre. All its efforts failed, however, because its members lacked dramatic talents and, being out of touch with the people, could not create a national drama.
Garcao (q.v.) led the way with the Theatro Novo, a bright little comedy in blank verse, and followed it up with another, Assem blea ou partida; but he did not persevere. Figueiredo felt he had a mission to restore the drama, and wrote 13 volumes of plays in prose and verse, hut, though he chose national subjects, and could invent plots and draw characters, •he could not make them live.
Finally, the bucolic poet Quita produced the tragedies Segunda Castro, Hermione and two others, but these imitations of the French were still-born.
Garrett read the masterpieces of contemporary foreign literature during his exiles in England and France, and, imbued with the national spirit, he produced in 1825 the poem Camdes. His poetry, like that of his fellow emigre, the austere Herculano, is eminently sincere and natural, but while his short lyrics are personal in sub ject and his longer poems historical, the verse of Herculano is gen erally religious or patriotic. The movement not only lost much of its virility and genuineness, but became ultra-romantic with A. F. de Castilho (q.v.), whose most conspicuous followers were Joao de Lemos and the poets of the collection entitled 0 Trovador ; Soares de Passos, a singer for the sad ; the melodious Thomas Ribeiro, who drew his inspiration from Zorrilla and voiced the opposition to a political union with Spain in the patriotic poem D. Jayme. Mendes Leal, a king in the heroic style, Gomes de Amorim and Bulhao Pato, belong more or less to the same school. On the other hand Jose Simoes Dias successfully sought inspiration from popular sources in his Peninsulares (187o).
In 1865 the revolt of the younger men of letters against the primacy of Castilho took the form of a fierce war of pamphlets.
The leaders in the movement were Anthero de Quental (q.v.) and Theophilo Braga, the first a student of German philosophy and poetry, the second a disciple of Comte and author of an epic of humanity, Visdo dos tempos, whose immense work in the spheres of poetry, criticism and literary history cannot be judged at present. In the issue literature gained considerably, and especially poetry, which entered on a period of active and rich production.
The Campo de fibres of Joao de Deus (q.v.) contains some of the most splendid short poems ever written in Portuguese. Simplicity, spontaneity and harmony distinguished his earlier verses, which are also his best. Anthero de Quental, the chief of the Coim brans, enshrined his metaphysical neo-Buddhistic ideas, over shadowed by extreme pessimism, and marked the stages of his mental evolution, in a sequence of finely-wrought sonnets. These place him in the sacred circle near to Heine and Leopardi, and though strongly individualistic, it is curious to note in them the influence of Germanism on the mind of a southerner. Odes mo dernas, written in youth, show him in revolutionary, free-thinking and combative mood, but the prose of his essays, e.g., Considera tions on the Philosophy of Portuguese Literary History, has that peculiar refinement, clearness and conciseness which stamped the later work of this sensitive thinker. A subtle irony pervades the Rirnas of Joao Penha, who links the Coimbrans with Guerra Jun queiro and the younger poets. Partly philosophical, partly natural istic, Junqueiro began with the ironical composition, A Morte de D. Joao; in Patria he evoked in a series of dramatic scenes and lashed with satire the kings of the Braganza dynasty; and in Os Simples (1892) he interprets in sonorous stanzas the life of country-folk by the light of his powerful imagination and pan theistic tendencies. His last poems appeared in Poesias Dispersas (1921). The Claridades de Sul of Gomes Leal, a militant anti Christian, at times recall Baudelaire, and flashes of genius run through Anti-Christo, which is alive with the instinct of revolt. The So of Antonio Nobre is intensely Portuguese in subjects, at mosphere and rhythmic sweetness, and had a deep influence. Cesario Verde sought to interpret universal nature and human sorrow, and the Parnassian Gonsalves Crespo may be termed a deeper, richer Coppee. His Miniaturas and Nocturnos have been re-edited by his widow, D. Maria Amalia Vaz de Carvalho, a highly gifted critic and essayist whose personality and cercle call to mind the 18th-century poetess, the Marqueza de Alorna. The French symbolists found an enthusiastic adept in Eugenio de Cas tro, who adopted a more natural and national manner in later works, such as Cancoes desta negra vida (1922) and Chamas de uma candeia velha (1925), and after the death of Junqueiro stood at the head of Portuguese poets. Antonio Feij6 and Jose de Sousa Monteiro have written verse remarkable by its, form. The most admired of the younger poets of this period, Antonio Correa de Oliveira, draws inspiration from the soil and religion, as in the Auto das Quatro Estacaes Ow ) and Pao nosso, Vinho alegre, Azeite de candeia (1922). A Minha terra (1916) contains some true poetry and technical skill.