Portugal has been active in the concrete poetry movement at least since 1956, when Decio Pignatari stopped there on his return to Brazil to speak about the concrete poem or ideogram. In 1962 an anthology of Brazilian concrete poetry was published in Lisbon --POESTA CONCRETA-- including the "Pilot Plan." In "Monumento" E. M. de Melo e Castro creates a monument to freedom around the letter "e" in "men" and "free" with one variation--"man"--as the responsibility of freedom progresses to the solider base of the statue where the platitude about men being free is reversed: LET THE FREE BE MEN. In "arranhisso" by Salette Tavares, word play takes place in relation to the visual image of the spider.


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