CONSTANTINO
Constantino is the story of a forgotten book. A book which began to be written in 1880, by a young professor, Daud Constantino Cury, one of the only Christian teachers lecturing in the city of Homs during the XIX century, in Syria which was subject to four centuries of Ottoman rule. The manuscript traveled to Brazil in 1926 together with the professor and his family who immigrated to start a new life in São Paulo.
With the death of its author in 1939, the manuscript was discovered by chance in São Paulo by Shakir Mustafa, a Syrian diplomat and literary researcher – years later this he became the Ministry for Education and Culture in Damascus. The book with the complete works of the professor was finally published in Syria. 500 pages in classic Arabic, with some of the first plays to be enacted on Syrian soil, apart from countless poems and chronicles.
Almost half a century later, on 11 September 2001, Otavio, a Brazilian great-grandson of Daud Constantino Cury, arrived in Damascus on a tourist trip. All he knew regarding his great-grandfather was that he had been a professor. During the only evening he spent in Homs, he mentioned the name of the professor to a group of strangers on the street and he was lead to the book.
Six years later, in 2007, translation of the literary works start in São Paulo. The story of his great-grandfather begins to emerge. His links with the resistance movement Alisslay Alarabi, whose leaders were executed by the Turks; his connections with Abu Khalil Al-Qabbani, known as the creator of Arabic theater and main author of the Arabic Renaissance – they worked together in the Khan Al-Zait theater in Damaskus and later the professor took Al-Qabbani to Homs after his theater theater was burnt by the Turks; his education in mathematics and music; his pioneering newspaper articles, while he directed a periodical in Homs; the history of his father, Constantino Cury, a religious man who wrote canonic laws adopted by the Orthodox churches of the East; his Greek ancestors in the XVIII Century.
In 2009 Otavio travels back to Syria carrying the translation of the works, to search for the living memory of Daud Constantino Cury. The guide to conduct the journey is now poetry and the story of his great-grandfather.
Constantino is the story of a forgotten book. A book which began to be written in 1880, by a young professor, Daud Constantino Cury, one of the only Christian teachers lecturing in the city of Homs during the XIX century, in Syria which was subject to four centuries of Ottoman rule. The manuscript traveled to Brazil in 1926 together with the professor and his family who immigrated to start a new life in São Paulo.
With the death of its author in 1939, the manuscript was discovered by chance in São Paulo by Shakir Mustafa, a Syrian diplomat and literary researcher – years later this he became the Ministry for Education and Culture in Damascus. The book with the complete works of the professor was finally published in Syria. 500 pages in classic Arabic, with some of the first plays to be enacted on Syrian soil, apart from countless poems and chronicles.
Almost half a century later, on 11 September 2001, Otavio, a Brazilian great-grandson of Daud Constantino Cury, arrived in Damascus on a tourist trip. All he knew regarding his great-grandfather was that he had been a professor. During the only evening he spent in Homs, he mentioned the name of the professor to a group of strangers on the street and he was lead to the book.
Six years later, in 2007, translation of the literary works start in São Paulo. The story of his great-grandfather begins to emerge. His links with the resistance movement Alisslay Alarabi, whose leaders were executed by the Turks; his connections with Abu Khalil Al-Qabbani, known as the creator of Arabic theater and main author of the Arabic Renaissance – they worked together in the Khan Al-Zait theater in Damaskus and later the professor took Al-Qabbani to Homs after his theater theater was burnt by the Turks; his education in mathematics and music; his pioneering newspaper articles, while he directed a periodical in Homs; the history of his father, Constantino Cury, a religious man who wrote canonic laws adopted by the Orthodox churches of the East; his Greek ancestors in the XVIII Century.
In 2009 Otavio travels back to Syria carrying the translation of the works, to search for the living memory of Daud Constantino Cury. The guide to conduct the journey is now poetry and the story of his great-grandfather.
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