In this engaged cultural environment, Sérgio Buarque de Holanda collaborated on and undertook avant-garde editorial projects, such as the journal Estética [Aesthetics], among many other initiatives. In 1927, he served as editor of the local newspaper O Progresso in the small town of Cachoeiro do Itapemirim, in the state of Espírito Santo. He worked as a literary critic for over a dozen newspapers, including Correio Paulistano , Diário Carioca , Folha de São Paulo , Rio-Jornal , A Manhã , and Diário de Notícias . He also contributed to numerous journals , such as A Cigarra , Fon-Fon , and Revista do Brasil . Over more than two decades, he worked for various telegraphic agencies, including Harvas, the United Press, and the Associated Press, where he became editor-in-chief in 1939. He also directed the Rio de Janeiro branch of the Jornal de Minas . Thus, it is impossible to understand his development as a historian without considering his trajectory as a journalist and literary critic, deeply engaged with the debates and controversies shaping not only Brazilian but also international cultural spheres.

Between 1929 and 1930, he was sent to Europe as a correspondent for the Diário de São Paulo and O Jornal for a two-year stay, settling in Berlin and visiting other cities in Germany and Poland. During this period , he attended Friedrich Meinecke’s lectures at the University of Berlin, became acquainted with Georg Simmel's intellectual circle, and immersed himself in the works of Max Weber and other authors from the Frankfurt School. It was here that he drafted the first version of his seminal work, Raízes do Brasil [Brazil's Roots] which was published in Rio de Janeiro in October 1936 by Livraria José Olympio Editora, inaugurating the Documentos Brasileiros [Brazilian Documents] series, then edited by Gilberto Freyre.

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | (Pdf)