MASTERPIECE ALERT

[Anonymous No.13809462]

I need to thank you bastards again for spamming pic related. I'm halfway through and it has become one of my favorite books ever so far - the kind of book I would bring with me if I had to pick five and go live in a hut. Despite the title, I find that the attitude of Bernardo Soares towards life has something incredibly reassuring, in that it depicts the possibility for a man to be so solidly grounded in his inner world to become - almost - untouchable from external life. Yes, there is regret, yes, there is sadness. But it really helps to read about someone else for whom the inner life of 'dream', which I take to be the inner life of whoever fantasizes about life more intensely than participating in it.
The book truly depicts an inner attitude which I think is very common in places like this - and in modern life in general - and it is an absolute masterpiece in trying to show how one can settle in it, and how inner life is the most fundamental aspect of life. There is something radical about how Pessoa talks about his own inner life: first, in that no self-deception is allowed and, second, in recognizing how absolutely central this is to the life of anyone. It is almost neoplatonic in its revolving "inward" and examining his own soul and the way it perceives and imagines things... Again, an incredible book, sorry about the ramblings but I want to talk about it.

Has anyone read it here? Also, what other Pessoa can I read? I know that there is a lot accessible in my own language (italian) but I also know he wrote some poems in English (the esoteric poems?) and I would like to read those too. Anyone knows if there is something available? I'm having a hard time finding it.

Also, general Pessoa thread: if some anon has studied the guy throughly I'd like to hear more about him. I have to say, the whole heteronym business sounds incredibly modern to me, it's as if one persone exploded into a whole literature. It is really a unique, mysterious, and wonderfully deep author. A character out of a Kafka novel, only he lived in real life... Suggest secondary literature as well, then, if you have ideas! I'd really like to read more about this guy. I can read in multiple languages, so don't worry about that

[Anonymous No.13809480]

Bump

[Anonymous No.13809504]

>>13809462

I tried to read it but it was boring so I stopped reading it.

[Anonymous No.13809509]

>>13809504
Me too but rather than boring I found it very pessimistic and, dunno if the term is appropriate but for lack of a better word on my part, solipsistic.

[Anonymous No.13809546]

Get into his heteronyms, understand them and then read the poetry by each. It's worth it.
Start with "Tabacaria" by Álvaro de Campos, it's one of his best if you don't know much about him.

[Anonymous No.13809549]

>>13809462
I wouldn't sya I studied it thoroughly, but I studied it at a Uni, I'm mortuguese and I studied him fairly intensely for a semester at one of our universities. What do you wanna know? It's tough (at least for me) to reccomend anything cause I'm still very uncomfortable with the idea of translate poetry so I haven't even tought about how apt for tranlation or looked into which of his poetry is better translated. But you're right, he's written some good stuff in English as well, in fact one of his poems, "Antinous", is one of the most important to understand him, particularly as it pertains to his heteronimy:
>http://arquivopessoa.net/textos/983

[Anonymous No.13809568]

>>13809549
Não conhecia este. obrigado, cumps

[Anonymous No.13809674]

>>13809546
Thank you anon, I will check it out!

>>13809549
Thank you. I usually read from italian editions with the portuguese text on the side, which is good because the languages are somewhat similar and I can understand a good half of what is being written. I generally try not to get poetry without the original text, because I share your worries on translating it.
My problem is mostly that his material is very scattered, and it is gathered in books that don't match from language to language, with the exception of the book of disquiet and a few others. In Italian there are some poems coming out in a two-volumes thing called "Una Sola Moltitudine", but I do not know whether they are good or not. I know even less about english editions, with the exception of the fact that some material is in English. I thought it would make sense for a volume of that material to exist, and it would probably be easier to get where I am right now, but I am not really finding much from him.
This is frustrating, because I have the feeling that this guy really was one of the greatest authors of the last century, a Joyce writing in a romance language, if you like, but who took a completely different direction.

Also, can I ask you where you studied it? I was very surprised not to find many courses on him in north america and the UK. I do not know if it is because he's not very popular in the anglophone world... Also, what books were you using, to study him, in terms of both primary and secondary sources?

[Anonymous No.13809689]

I have tried to read it three times and couldn’t get past the first two pages.
Convince me to keep going

[Anonymous No.13809707]

>>13809674
>This is frustrating, because I have the feeling that this guy really was one of the greatest authors of the last century
He really was but Portugal lost the world culture lottery, so nobody gives a shit. If he was an Anglo, a Frenchman or a Russian everyone would be slobbering his balls 24/7

[Anonymous No.13809738]

>>13809707
It is true. But south american culture has had some big names recently - I'm thinking of Bolano - and they have a strong literary culture. My perception is that it is stronger than the US, where the 'public intellectual' or the 'public writer' either does not exist or is constantly ridiculed - but I may be mistaken. Maybe there is space, there, for a character like Pessoa? Is he ever mentioned in school in place like brazil, for instance, where they speak portuguese?

[Anonymous No.13809802]

>>13809462
It's good and all but I'm just allergic to this ">tfw too smart for these normals" bullshit

[Anonymous No.13809805]

>>13809738
Yeah, Spanish South America gets press because it's cool and Anglo young adults go there to backpack and get kidnapped, but nobody gives a shit about Brazil by association, and Brazil has some great authors as well.
Brazillians love Pessoa, arguably more than the portuguese. Even the poor can quote a thing or two.

[Anonymous No.13809879]

>>13809802
>tfw too smart for these normals
Everyone in this board including yourself has this actual thought on the daily

[Pessoa No.13809890]

>>13809462
I mean, it's really, really good, specially if you relate yourself strongly to the "character", but let's not get carried away here, come on. It's not like I've written the best thing since loafed bread or something, although my work in fact is pretty good.

[Anonymous No.13809922]

>>13809879
sure but atleast I have the decency to be ashamed of this basic ass way of thinking

I would never write anything like that and it would be a great shame to have it published

[Anonymous No.13809947]

>>13809462
How do I find this book in the original Portuguese? All I see online are 1. the English translation and 2. the muttified Brazil version

pls help

[Anonymous No.13809963]

>>13809890
Hi Fernando, how's life? Are you up for a nata and an espresso sometime?

[Anonymous No.13810186]

>>13809947
>https://bookslabs.xyz/?hash=AZkZTO5kDO3kzM1IDNiBTNwEDOmNjNjVje5hnLzJWYsN3av9mY

[Anonymous No.13810409]

>>13810186
thank you kind sir :)

[Anonymous No.13810548]

>>13809674
My first piece of advice would really be, if you find yourself that compelled by his work, to learn portuguese. I know it's a lot to ask, and I certainly don't think you're any less if you're not willing to do that, but it's really indispensable to read the poetry and the academic literature (i.e. secondary sources). The translated poetry has the problem we've mentioned and the academic work is hard to get stuff that you'd struggle to find even in portugal outside of some specialized libraries in universities or really big public libraries in Porto or Lisbon, maybe. I don't think it's getting translated anytime soon anon.

I'd suggest this as a starter: https://thenbooks.xyz/?hash=QN3MDN4EGO3kzM1IDNiBTNmJTOmNjNjVje5hnLzt2bvJmblhGd as it is in English and it's a compilation of prose. Thus, you can bypass the poetry, language and dispersion problem. It's just a little sample though.

If you do get into the poetry, and particularly the heteronymical poetry (it's mostly translated to english on libgen and other site but, again...translated poetry...) to understand the poetry in some way you should probably read the prefaces and other writings on "their" (the heteronyms) paganism by Ricardo Reis and António Mora (probably not translated extensively) and perhaps most importantly read "Notas para Recordação do meu mestre Caeiro" (roughly translates to "Notes for remembrance of my master Caeiro") by Álvaro de Campos. You may have better luck with the translations on this one as at least in portugal and portuguese-speaking countries it's pretty famous and read by many people. After reading this poetry, these texts give you, not an explanation, but more like the musings of the different heteronymic voices/minds on the poetry of Caeiro but also of the others, including the ortonym (aka the irl Pessoa), and of course by understanding the poetry of his heteronyms you're also necessarily understanding "his" poetry, by proxy. A small part of this stuff is already in the book i linked, in the parts about paganism, neopaganism and sensationism

[Anonymous No.13811010]

>>13810548
Thank you very much!

[Anonymous No.13811082]

>>13811010
Just found this translation of part of the "Notes", seems to have some of the most important ones:
>https://pastebin.com/EKxJpVcx
I got it from this link which has some great stuff on Pessoa in general you may find useful:
>https://archive.org/stream/pessoasalbertoca00edit/pessoasalbertoca00edit_djvu.txt

[Anonymous No.13811587]

>>13809462
Being Portuguese, I'm always surprised at how so many foreigners love Pessoa. Maybe I should try reading him again

[Anonymous No.13811794]

I appreciate Pessoa because he helped me explain how I really feel to my therapist. I consider The Book of Disquiet to be one of the most important books I've ever bought. I keep it by my bedside to read at 3 in the morning.
pls dont bully