ABSTRACT
Seventy years ago A rosa do povo joined the pantheon of Brazilian literature undisputed masterpieces. This article discusses the reasons that made Carlos Drummond de Andrade’s book a model of political and social commitment focused on the fight against Nazi-fascism in World War II. A formal analysis of several poems inscribes the rare complexity of such poetry in the circumstances of war, of Brazilian modernization, the poet’s anti-bourgeois politics and the history of modernism, trying to interpret the historical and social significance of his irresolutions.
KEYWORDS: Brazilian poetry; A rosa do povo; Carlos Drummond de Andrade; poetic commitment; modernism