Cornélio Penna


was a Brazilian novelist and plastic artist. He is better known for pioneering psychological realism in Brazilian literature.

Biography

Born in Petrópolis into a middle-class family, he soon moved to Itabira, a small rural town that would later inspire the settings of some of his novels. According to Carlos Drummond de Andrade, Cornélio was born, lived and died interiorly in Itabira. He would then complete his secondary education in Campinas and go on to study at the Law School of São Paulo, from where he earned his Bachelor's degree.
Established in Rio de Janeiro, he began working as a professional artist, holding solo exhibitions of his canvases and drawing illustrations for newspapers. During this period he attended meetings held by the traditionalist Centro Dom Vital. In the early 1930s, he abandoned his career as an artist to dedicate himself to writing.
His early novels drew the attention of many critics. Alceu Amoroso Lima compared his prose and introspective themes to those of French-American author Julien Green. Academic critics recognized Penna, together with Octavio de Faria and Lúcio Cardoso, as representatives of an intimist style of realism, as opposed to the predominant socially-oriented regionalism of the time.
He died in 1958, leaving behind an unfinished novel, Alma Branca, which was published posthmously in 2020 along with other texts.