The “Atlantic” recreation of the Portuguese colonizing process

The Atlântico magazine (1941-1945)

Abstract

The Atlântico magazine was part of a larger project encompassed by Portugal and Brazil in the early 1940’s. More precisely, in 1941 is signed the Luso-Brazilian culture agreement that resulted, among other elements, in the idealization of a project based on creating a magazine of “culture” and “art”. From this process arises Atlântico magazine, which owes its name to the attempt of “finding a word sufficiently elastic, undulating to synthesize the vague and concrete of our aspirations, dreams and the reality of our vision”, in the words of one of its directors António Ferro. Founded in 1942, the Atlântico magazine has had as proponents, António Ferro, the director of “Secretariado da Propaganda Nacional” (SPN) (Director of the Bureau of Propaganda Nacional) of Portugal and the director of the brazilian “Departamento de Imprensa e Propaganda” (DIP) (Department of Press and Propaganda), Lourival Fontes. This article aims to discuss the idea defended by its writers that the “nature” of the Atlântico magazine is to be a journal of “culture, literature and art”, “avoiding dealing with social problems, political or economic in the modern world, even when they concern to life in Brazil or Portugal”. Rebuilding the Portuguese colonization process through the pages of the review consists in a fruitful path through which this discussion may be conducted.