The career of Joaquim Nabuco in the Brazil of the late Empire and early Republic much resembled a shooting star that briefly flames across the heavens, catching everyone’s eye, before it vanishes into the void. The “spoilt child” of the Empire in João Capistrano de Abreu’s phrase, Nabuco found inspiration and purpose in the campaign against slavery. With the achievement of abolition in 1888 and the fall of the Empire in 1889, he lost direction and became an outsider. His appointment as ambassador first to London (1899) and then to Washington, D.C. (1905) rescued him, but at a certain cost. “He is white, handsome, cultured,” Capistrano de Abreu observed, “he is precisely the right person to give the wrong impression of Brazil abroad.” Great as Nabuco’s success was as envoy, he was essentially a salesman, working to keep the British and the Americans happy and benevolent toward Brazil.
Joaquim Nabuco’s...
