He was also a translator for Editora Globo, one of the founders of the Eduardo Guimarães Foundation, which he came to chair, and a member of the Historical and Geographical Institute of Rio Grande do Sul and the State Folklore Commission.

According to Joana Figueiredo, "as an intellectual ahead of his time, the author already knew that not all history is made of myth and grandeur, but of stitches and lines, knots and buttons – with a few beads and turbans to give it color and joy.

"[6] In works that are a mixture of chronicle and historical essay, such as Imagens Sentimentais da Cidade (1940, City of Porto Alegre Award[7]) and Sacadas e Sacadinhas Porto-Alegrenses (1945), he interweaves his view of historian with his poetic side and his experience as a citizen, describing the changes in the urban scenario by the passage of time and the concomitant changes in the social meanings of the spaces and the lives of their occupants, focusing on the study of the "identity of the citizens of Porto Alegre, weakened by the advent of transformations in urban space in vogue from the 1940s," as Charles Monteiro stated, and at the same time denouncing, dismaying, the accelerated "erasing of the marks of the city of yesteryear," such as the old buildings, since he understood them as necessary elements for the preservation of a sense of identity for the locals.

[8] Joana Figueiredo believes that "by historicizing the region and his city, in a sentimental and engaged way, Athos Damasceno inserts himself as an author committed to the past, its present and a future of the letters and arts of Rio Grande do Sul.

[5] "His interest in images, be they press caricatures, clothing and textiles, or missionary sculptures and the work of painters such as Pedro Weingärtner, attest to a founding role as a historian of art and visual culture on the scene of Porto Alegre and Rio Grande do Sul.

Damasceno took an active part in this process, analyzing which were the ruptures with the past and which were the continuities, and how they should be interpreted and re-signified, considering that modernity should necessarily be included in the new identity that was sought to be consolidated.

[10] He did not deny the past, but demanded an impartial interpretation of the old sources and condemned those who tried to uncritically resurrect old ways of being and seeing the world, bypassing the social changes that the times had brought, the so-called saudosistas, who summed up Rio Grande do Sul people in the figure of the gaucho, then erected as the ideal image of the brave, free, and fighting man, and centered the state's cultural heritage on the past of the campeiro ("countryman") the military, and the Portuguese contribution.

We possess a vast colonial zone, where men of other races, from other climates, work, suffer, and fight with us for the progress of the state, and where the highest and most seductive motifs of beauty are discovered and found, waiting for someone to interpret them.

The largest portion of our population stirs in modern, bustling cities where the most intense dramas, the most disturbing tragedies, and the most audacious conquests, are there every day to inspire remarkable works of great repercussion.

The first, Poemas do Sonho e da Desesperança (1925), is dedicated to his wife, Clara, and centers on the theme of mystical and spiritual love, tinged with melancholy, a sense of longing, and a desire to escape from reality, which was offset by hope and pity.

that the city mourns the garden of its poets..."In the field of prose literature, the novels Moleque: novelinha de arrabalde (1938) and Menininha (1941) are highlights, as well as the short story book Persianas Verdes: contos e manchas (1967), which set prosaic characters in the humble settings of the streets and houses of the periphery, in the bars and popular parties, leading often miserable, sad and meaningless lives, lost in unsatisfied dreams of freedom and justice and excluded from the bright hustle and bustle and big events of urban centers, a theme that knew great vogue at the time.

[5][6][20][21] In the words of Celso Luft, his production in this field is precious, being a cultured author, of great analytical and interpretative capacity who, handling a clean and fluent prose, left books at the same time instructive and pleasant to read.

[3] On the other hand, his poetic and literary production, "widely spread and admired,"[22] which gave him national renown while he lived[23] and made Carlos Reverbel define him as a poet of great skill[24] is now forgotten.