Olavo de Carvalho

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Olavo de Carvalho (born April 30, 1947, at the city of Campinas, in the state of São Paulo) is a Brazilian philosopher and political essayist. His works have brought him a number of admirers, an array of followers - and a multitude of critics. Nonetheless he has expressed his unease with the label "right-wing" and the tendency to attempt to place his work on a crude political spectrum.

Carvalho's works deal with various subjects, especially politics, philosophy, culture, society, media, criticism and art.

The main theme in Carvalho's essays and articles is the defense of human interiority against the tyranny of collective authority; or, in his own words: "Only the subject's individual consciousness can testify for the unwitnessed acts, and there is no act more deprived of external testimony than the act of knowing."

His book "O Imbecil Coletivo: Atualidades Inculturais Brasileiras" (The Collective Imbecile: Brazilian Incultural Current Activities), released in 1996, prompted many new admirers and haters. In another book, "O Jardim das Aflições" (The Afflictions Garden"), Carvalho makes a correlation between Epicurus and Marx's thinking, and shows how the advent of the modern thinking is creating a civil religion in loss of the sacred traditions, especially Christianity.

Olavo de Carvalho is also the editor of an online newspaper called Mídia Sem Máscara (Maskless Media), a media-watch experiment in which he tries to address errors and omissions from what is usually seen by him and his contributors as a very strong leftist bias in the press.

On July 4, 2005, Carvalho was fired from the newspaper O Globo, where he had published a weekly article for several years. By the same week, the leftist organization São Paulo Forum, which had never been mentioned in the newspaper except in his articles, suddenly began to appear in the paper. On the Veja issue of the same week, the organization also appeared in a uncompromising note in the gossip pages.

Nowadays, Olavo de Carvalho lives in Richmond, Virginia, USA, with scarce means.

[edit] Published Works

In Brazil:

A Longa Marcha da Vaca para o Brejo: O Imbecil Coletivo II, 1998
Como Vencer um Debate sem Precisar Ter Razão. Comentários à "Dialética Erística" de Arthur Schopenhauer., 1997
O Futuro do Pensamento Brasileiro. Estudos sobre o Nosso Lugar no Mundo., 1998
Aristóteles em Nova Perspectiva. Introdução à Teoria dos Quatro Discursos (reedição aumentada de Uma Filosofia Aristotélica da Cultura), 1994
O Imbecil Coletivo: Atualidades Inculturais Brasileiras., 1996
O Jardim das Aflições. De Epicuro à Ressurreição de César — Ensaio sobre o Materialismo e a Religião Civil., 1995
A Nova Era e a Revolução Cultural: Fritjof Capra & Antonio Gramsci, 1994
O Caráter como Forma Pura da Personalidade, 1993
Os Gêneros Literários: Seus Fundamentos Metafísicos, 1993
Símbolos e Mitos no Filme "O Silêncio dos Inocentes", 1993
Fronteiras da Tradição. São Paulo, Nova Stella, 1986
Astrologia e Religião. São Paulo, Nova Stella, 1986
Astros e Símbolos. São Paulo, Nova Stella, 1985
Universalidade e Abstração e Outros Estudos. (São Paulo, Speculum), 1983
Questões de Simbolismo Astrológico. São Paulo, Speculum, 1983
O Crime da Madre Agnes ou: A Confusão entre Espiritualidade e Psiquismo. São Paulo, Speculum, 1983
A Imagem do Homem na Astrologia. Jvpiter. São Paulo, 1980