ABL collectionTeixeira in Rio de Janeiro, 2023ABL collection
In 2023, Heloisa Teixeira—formerly known as Heloisa Buarque de Hollanda—was named an “immortal” of the Brazilian Academy of Letters (ABL). However, the core of her intellectual and academic work was always linked to art that “challenged the eternity of poetry,” as she herself described in an interview last year on the podcast of the literary magazine Quatro Cinco Um. The antagonists of literary immortality were the poets of the mimeograph generation, who earned their “generation” title based on the 1976 release of the anthology 26 poetas de hoje (“26 poets of today;” Editorial Labor), edited by Teixeira. A professor emeritus at the School of Communication of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), she died on March 28 at the age of 85.
The publication of the collection and later, in 1980, of her doctoral thesis titled “Impressões de viagem: CPC, vanguarda e desbunde (1960/70)” (Travel impressions: CPC, avant-garde, and resistance (1960/70); Editora Brasiliense), defended the previous year at UFRJ, were harshly criticized for legitimizing work considered vulgar and poorly written. However, as argued by André Botelho, a sociology professor at UFRJ, and Caroline Tresoldi, a researcher at the same institution, in the article “Democratização da cultura: Heloisa Buarque de Hollanda e a crítica brasileira dos anos 1970” (Democratization of culture: Heloisa Buarque de Hollanda and Brazilian criticism in the 1970s; 2025), Teixeira sought to “document the plurality of poetry strategies as a place of privilege for the testimony of a young social experience.”
The collection shone a light on many names in so-called marginal poetry, such as Ana Cristina Cesar (1952–1983) and Roberto Piva (1937–2010), says Marcos Siscar, from the Institute of Language Studies at the University of Campinas (UNICAMP). “Heloisa played a fundamental role in promoting the new poetry of the 1970s, in the sense of endorsing the style,” says the researcher.
Over time, her thesis became a landmark in Brazilian cultural criticism, as highlighted by Botelho, author of the biography Helô Teixeira: Crítica como vida (Helô Teixeira: Criticism as life; Bazar do Tempo, 2024), written together with Tresoldi. “The work was not only innovative in terms of theme, but it also challenged the traditional form of academic discourse by using a first-person narrative,” says the sociologist.
Teixeira was born in Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo State, in 1939, before moving to Rio de Janeiro as a child, where she grew up and established her academic career. She completed a degree in classical literature at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio) in 1961 and three years later began her career as a university professor at UFRJ, as an assistant to literary critic Afrânio Coutinho (1911–2000). At the time, she taught courses on the writers Lima Barreto (1881–1922) and José de Alencar (1829–1877).
The researcher always sought to create a dialogue between literature and other forms of art. In her master’s dissertation, “Macunaíma: Da literatura ao cinema” (Macunaíma: From literature to cinema; 1978), defended at UFRJ, she analyzed the transposition of the classic novel by Mário de Andrade (1893–1945) to the big screen. Cinema, in fact, was not only an object of research for Teixeira, but also of practice; she directed documentaries, including Joaquim Cardozo (1977) and Dr. Alceu (1981). In the 1980s, she was head of the Museum of Image and Sound (MIS) in Rio de Janeiro, appointed by anthropologist Darcy Ribeiro (1922–1997), then vice governor of the state.
Criticism of Brazil’s authoritarian regime and its influence on the country’s cultural output were fundamental to her academic career. In addition to the tensions of the Brazilian political landscape, she added a new layer to her work—gender and race studies—after doing a postdoctoral fellowship in sociology of culture at Columbia University, New York, in 1984, supervised by Jean Franco (1924–2022).
Nádia Battella Gotlib, a retired professor of Brazilian literature at the University of São Paulo (USP), met Teixeira in the 1980s through the “Women in Literature” working group, linked to Brazil’s National Association of Postgraduate Studies and Research in Literature and Linguistics (ANPOLL). “Heloisa stimulated and established ‘women’s studies’ in Brazil, publishing several works on feminism,” says Gotlib.
Her link to feminist movements was consolidated academically in 1986, when Teixeira founded the Interdisciplinary Center for Contemporary Studies (CIEC) at UFRJ for research on contemporary cultural production with a focus on race and gender debates. During that period, she also published the book Tendências e impasses: O feminismo como crítica da cultura (Trends and impasses: Feminism as a critique of culture; Rocco, 1994).
The researcher closely followed the emergence of fourth-wave feminism, which even motivated her to stop using the surname of her first husband, lawyer Luiz Buarque de Hollanda (1939–1999), in 2023. In recent years, she published writings that continued to spark intense intergenerational debates, such as the essay Feminista, eu? (Feminist, me?; Bazar do Tempo, 2022), in addition to editing works such as Explosão feminista: Arte, cultura, política e universidade (Feminist explosion: Art, culture, politics, and university; Companhia das Letras, 2018) and Pensamento feminista hoje: Sexualidades no Sul Global (Feminist thought today: Sexualities in the Global South; Bazar do Tempo, 2020).
In 1994, Teixeira created the Advanced Program for Contemporary Culture (PACC), an outreach project linked to the university that combines teaching and research in experimental formats. Later, in 2009, together with Numa Ciro, a doctor of literature from UFRJ, she created the University of Quebradas, linked to the PACC and described by the researcher in a speech at the ABL as her “greatest project.” The specialization and improvement program is a space for producers and artists from the margins of society to exchange academic and popular knowledge.
Since it was founded, the project has welcomed “800 participants, expanding democratic access to research institutions and recognizing diversity,” says Eduardo Coelho, a professor at UFRJ’s School of Languages and Literature and current coordinator of the PACC. The University of Quebradas is yet another reflection of the researcher’s efforts to develop channels for “listening, sharing, and establishing dialogue with multiple demands” in the academic world, adds Drica Madeira, pedagogical coordinator of the initiative, who was supervised by Teixeira during her PhD in literature at UFRJ.
Last year, Teixeira organized a series of conferences and workshops on the writer Machado de Assis (1839–1908) through the University of Quebradas, in partnership with the ABL. Titled “Machado Quebradeiro,” the events addressed the author and his work through the lens of race and class. “Heloisa liked to provoke ‘short circuits’ with the aim of establishing new forms of circulating and sharing ideas,” explains Hélio de Seixas Guimarães, professor of Brazilian literature at USP and a scholar of Machado.
Teixeira died from complications of pneumonia and acute respiratory failure. She leaves behind her three sons, Lula, Pedro, and André, and seven grandchildren. She was the widow of photographer João Carlos Horta, who died in 2020.
Republish