Fernando Pessoa - Blog Posts

PRATICAI O BEM

“Digo-vos: praticai o bem”.

Por quê?

O que ganhais com isso?

Nada, não ganhais nada.

Nem dinheiro, nem amor, nem respeito, nem talvez paz de espírito.

Talvez não ganheis nada disso.

Então por que vos digo: Praticai o bem?

Porque não ganhais nada com isso.

Vale a pena praticá-lo por isto mesmo.

(Fernando Pessoa)

O poeta é um fingidor. Finge tão completamente Que chega a fingir que é dor A dor que deveras sente. E os que leem o que escreve, Na dor lida sentem bem, Não as duas que ele teve, Mas só a que eles não têm. E assim nas calhas de roda Gira, a entreter a razão, Esse comboio de corda Que se chama coração.

Fernando Pessoa

When we live constantly in the abstract - whether it be abstractness of thought or of feelings one has thought - it soon comes about that contrary to our own feelings and our own will the things in real life, which, according to us, we should feel most deeply turn into phantasms. Living so much on one's imagination actually erodes one's ability to imagine, especially one's ability to imagine the real. Living mentally on what is not and cannot be, we are, in the end, unable even to ponder what might really be.

Fernando Pessoa Book of Disquiet

"En çok acıtan hisler, en çok yakan duygular, en saçma olanlardır. İmkânsız şeylerin arzusunu duymak kesinlikle imkânsız oldukları içindir; geçmişe olmayan şeyler için duyulan özlem; olmuş olabilecekler için duyulan arzu; başka birisi olmadığın için duyulan pişmanlık; dünyanın varoluşundan duyulan tatminsizlik. Bütün bu ruhun bilincinin ara tonları, bizi kendiliğimizin sonsuz bir günbatımında, acı dolu bir manzaranın içinde yaratır."

Fernando Pessoa

IX — Oh to be idle loving idleness!

Like a fierce beast self-penned in a bait-lair, My will to act binds with excess my action, Not-acting coils the thought with raged despair, And acting rage doth paint despair distraction. Like someone sinking in a treacherous sand, Each gesture to deliver sinks the more; The struggle avails not, and to raise no hand, Though hut more slowly useless, we’ve no power. Hence live I the dead life each day doth bring, Repurposed for next day’s repurposing. Fernando Pessoa

I don’t know how many souls I have. I’ve changed at every moment. I always feel like a stranger. I’ve never seen or found myself. From being so much, I have only soul. A man who has soul has no calm. A man who sees is just what he sees. A man who feels is not who he is.

Attentive to what I am and see, I become them and stop being I. Each of my dreams and each desire Belongs to whoever had it, not me. I am my own landscape, I watch myself journey - Various, mobile, and alone. Here where I am I can’t feel myself.

That’s why I read, as a stranger, My being as if it were pages. Not knowing what will come And forgetting what has passed, I note in the margin of my reading What I thought I felt. Rereading, I wonder: “Was that me?” God knows, because he wrote it.

Fernando Pessoa,  I don't know how many souls I have

Penis Saudade would go crazy

I fully understand why "character A is astounded at the sight of character B's penis" is a specific kink that gets tagged for, but the fact that some platforms choose to tag this kink as "penis awe" is unintentionally very funny. Now I'm picturing penis experience kink tags for all those other allegedly transcendent emotions in the glossary of your Philosophy 101 textbook. Penis faith. Penis Weltschmerz. Penis apprehension of the absurd.

Esto

«Dicen que finjo o miento todo lo que escribo. No. Yo simplemente siento con la imaginación. No uso el corazón. Todo lo que sueño o vivo, lo que me falla o termina, es como una terraza sobre otra cosa aún. Esa cosa es la que es bella. Por eso escribo en medio de lo que no está cerca, libre de mi titubeo, serio de lo que no es. ¿Sentir? ¡Sienta quien lee!»

Fernando Pessoa, «Esto»

Fernando Pessoa // Franz Kafka

Fernando Pessoa, A Little Larger Than the Entire Universe: Selected Poems

[16/100] days of productivity

Finally decided to tackle reading something by Fernando Pessoa. I don't know why but his most popular one, The Book of Disquiet, intimidates me so much, so I decided to start with his poetry. So far so good. Exquisite, I should say!