Guilherme de Melo

Guilherme Jose de Melo (born January 20, 1931 in Lourenço Marques , today Maputo, Mozambique , † June 29, 2013 in Lisbon , Portugal ) was a Portuguese journalist, writer and LGBTI activist, the first prominent gay activist in Portugal.

Live and act

Melo was born the son of Portuguese in what was then the Portuguese colony of Portuguese East Africa , now Mozambique. At the age of 18 he was already working as a journalist for the newspaper "Noticias de Lourenço Marques". His first book was published in 1959, a volume of short stories. He was married to a woman from 1957 to 1961 and divorced in 1961; later he had this declared a marriage of convenience.

His work "As raizes do Odio", published in 1962, was confiscated by the PIDE secret police in Mozambique and was subject to censorship.

After the Carnation Revolution in 1974 , he left Mozambique and lived in Portugal until his death. From then on, he worked as a journalist for the Diario de Noticias in Lisbon until he retired in 1996. He had campaigned against the Portuguese dictator Salazar early on and advocated Mozambique's independence, which took place in 1975.

He came out in 1982 in the book "Ser homosexual em Portugal", which gave celebrities and non-prominent homosexuals a face. The book was with the occasion that in the same year the criminality of homosexuality in Portugal was finally abolished by the parliament. Since then, Melo has worked as the intellectual homosexual voice of Portugal in the fight for the rights of LGBTI people through numerous articles and books.

He was close friends with the murdered homosexual Portuguese journalist Carlos Castro and for around fifty years until his death with the homosexual Portuguese poet Eduardo Pitta .

On June 29, 2013, Guilherme de Melo died at the age of 82 from complications from cancer in Lisbon in the São Jose Hospital. He was buried in the Alto de São João cemetery.

Works (selection)

Menina Elisa, 1959, short stories.
A estranha aventura: contos, 1961, short stories.
As Raizes do Odio, 1962, novel.
Mocambique, north-guerra e paz, 1969, non-fiction book about the situation in Mozambique.
Menino Candulo, senhor comandante, 1974.
A Sombra dos Dias, 1981, autobiographical novel.
Os leos nao dormen esta noite, 1989
Gayvota: um olhar (por dentro) da homossexualidade "(2002)
Cronica de bon costumes, 2004.
A Raiz da Pele, 2011, poetry.

Awards (selection)

Premio Literario de Circulo de Leitores, 1981.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME	Melo, Guilherme de
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Portuguese journalist, writer and LGBTI activist
DATE OF BIRTH	January 20, 1931
PLACE OF BIRTH	Lourenço Marques , today Maputo, Mozambique
DATE OF DEATH	June 29, 2013
Place of death	Lisbon , Portugal