It is astonishing that there are professional literary critics, and good ones, who have written pages and pages about Augusto dos Anjos without ever suspecting that the “poet of melancholy,” when fitting words such as “helminth,” “hookworm,” or “colpoda” into his verses, could have done so with a smile. But no… there are critics who, in truth, did nothing but interpret the poet—a poet!—literally. And, in a literal sense, melancholy and despair are far away from humor, right? What a thing! Those who do not understand how much fun it must have been for Augusto dos Anjos, after the brilliant creation of his poetic personality, to force his verses to reach the peak of eccentricity, say monumental and hilarious nonsense. Perhaps no artist has ever had so much fun giving vent to such truly distressing psychological content. Because, in his verses, are real the despair, the melancholy, the anguish, and also the humor. Not to perceive this is to perceive nothing.