Fernando Pessoa was a Portuguese poet and writer, widely regarded as one of the foremost literary figures of the 20th century. He is celebrated for his pioneering use of 'heteronyms' – distinct literary personalities with their own unique styles, philosophies, and temperaments, allowing him to explore a vast range of poetic expression. Each heteronym, such as Alberto Caeiro, Ricardo Reis, and Álvaro de Campos, offered a different voice and worldview, contributing to a multifaceted and profound body of work. Pessoa's innovative approach to authorship created a rich tapestry of Portuguese literature.
Alvaro de Campos, one of Pessoa's key poetic heteronyms, emerged in 1914 and is characterized by his celebration of modernity and the machine age, reflecting the influence of futurism on Portuguese poetry. Born in 1890 in the Algarve and educated in Glasgow, he had a diverse life as an engineer and a public figure, contributing essays and reviews to Portuguese periodicals. This volume focuses on the latter part of his poetic works, while earlier poems will be published in a forthcoming collection.
Fernando Pessoa is Portugal's most important contemporary poet. He wrote under several identities, which he called heteronyms: Albet Caeiro, Alvaro de Campos, Ricardo Reis, and Bernardo Soares. He wrote fine poetry under his own name as well, and each of his "voices" is completely different in subject, temperament, and style. This volume brings back into print the comprehensive collection of his work published by Ecco Press in 1986.
Richard Zenith's collection showcases the complete major poetry of Fernando Pessoa, a poet renowned for his extraordinary talent in the 20th century. This volume highlights Pessoa's unique voice and diverse styles, reflecting his complex literary persona and profound themes. Through Zenith's translation, readers can explore the depth of Pessoa's work, which has left a lasting impact on modern poetry.
The Book of Disquiet is one of the great literary works of the twentieth century. Written over the course of Fernando Pessoa's life, it was first published in 1982, pieced together from the thousands of individual manuscript pages left behind by Pessoa after his death in 1935. Now this fragmentary modernist masterpiece appears in a major new edition that unites Margaret Jull Costa's celebrated translation with the most complete version of the text ever produced. It is presented here, for the first time in English, by order of original composition, and accompanied by facsimiles of the original manuscript.Narrated principally by an assistant bookkeeper named Bernardo Soares - an alias of sorts for Pessoa himself - The Book of Disquiet is 'the autobiobraphy of someone who never existed', a mosaic of dreams, of hope and despair; a hymn to the streets and cafés of 1930s Lisbon, and an extraordinary record of the inner life of one of the century's most important writers. This new edition represents the most complete vision of Pessoa's genius.
The largest and richest English-language volume of poetry from “the greatest twentieth-century writer you have never heard of” (Los Angeles Times) Edited, Translated, and with an Introduction by Richard Zenith, the author of the Pulitzer Prize finalist Pessoa: A Biography A Penguin Classic Writing obsessively in French, English, and Portuguese, poet Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) left a prodigious body of work, much of it credited to three “heteronyms”―Alberto Caeiro, Ricardo Reis, and Alvaro de Campos―alter egos with startlingly different styles, points of view, and biographies. Offering a unique sampling of his most famous voices, this collection features Pessoa’s major, best-known works and several stunning poems that have come to light only in this century, including his long, highly autobiographical swan song. Featuring a rich body of work that has never before been translated into English, this is the finest introduction available to the stunning breadth of Pessoa’s genius.
The Washington Post Book World has written that Fernando Pessoa was "Portugal's greatest writer of the twentieth century [though] some critics would even leave off that last qualifying phrase" and "one of the most appealing European modernists, equal in command and range to his contemporaries Rilke and Mandelstam." The Selected Prose of Fernando Pessoa, a Los Angeles Times Best Book of 2001, spans playful philosophical inquiry, Platonic dialogue, and bitter intellectual scrapping between Pessoa and his many literary alter egos ("heteronyms"). The heteronyms launch movements and write manifestos, and one of them attempts to break up Pessoa's only known romantic relationship. Also included is a generous selection from Pessoa's masterpiece, The Book of Disquiet, freshly translated by Richard Zenith from newly discovered materials. The Selected Prose of Fernando Pessoa is an important record of a crucial part of the literary canon. "Zenith's selection is beautifully translated, compact while appropriately diverse." -- Benjamin Kunkel, Los Angeles Times "[Pessoa] is one of those writers as addictive, and endearing, as Borges and Calvino." -- Michael Dirda, The Washington Post Book World
Zum ersten Mal auf deutsch wird hier der kleine Text des Halbheteronyms Baron von Teive veröffentlicht, eine wichtige Ergänzung zum Buch der Unruhe und ein wichtiger Bestandteil des Gesamtwerks Pessoas. lvaro Coehlho de Athayde ist der 14. Baron von Teive, übrigens der einzige Selbstmörder im Werk Pessoas, und entdeckt voller Schmerz, daß er die Bücher, die er schreiben wollte, nicht schreiben kann. „Ich habe, wie mir scheint, die volle Entfaltung meines Verstandes erreicht. Und daher werde ich mich töten.“ Seine persönliche Chronik, eine Sammlung negativer Lebenslektionen: eine von Einsamkeit geprägte Kindheit, eine enge, aber unerwiderte Bindung an die Mutter, ein abgeschlossenes Studium - ohne Folgen -, eine wohlhabende Existenz auf dem Lande, Schwierigkeiten im sexuellen Umgang mit Frauen, Amputation des linken Beines etc. „Dem Baron fehlten im Leben nicht nur ein abgeschlossenes schriftstellerisch-philosophisches Werk, sexuelle Eroberungen, die Mutter und das linke Bein, ihm fehlte auch der Sinn für Humor.“
