«O Sentimento dum Ocidental» — «Ave-Marias» | Lisboa está doente

Lisbon, as night falls, transforms into a space of contrasts: between progress and decadence, between modernity and melancholy. In this video, we analyze the first section — “Ave Marias” — of “O Sentimento dum Ocidental” (1880), by Cesário Verde, where the poetic subject begins his wandering through an urban, oppressive, and profoundly critical Lisbon. The work establishes a direct dialogue with Camões' “Os Lusíadas,” revisiting the epic imagery of the “western Lusitanian shore” to confront the grandeur of the past with the degraded reality of the present. Amidst fog, gas, crowds, and a feeling of suffocation, Cesário Verde constructs one of the most important portraits of urban modernity in Portuguese poetry. 📌 Works cited: • The Feeling of a Westerner — Cesário Verde • The Lusiads — Luís de Camões 🔎 TAGS Cesário Verde, The Feeling of a Westerner, Ave Marias, poem analysis, Portuguese literature, 11th grade Portuguese, The Lusiads, Camões, Portuguese poetry, Portuguese realism, Portuguese naturalism, literary analysis, summary of The Feeling of a Westerner, interpretation of the poem by Cesário Verde, Portuguese exam, 11th grade literature, Lisbon in the 19th century, realist poetry, school literature