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Favourite quotes (21448)

“God wills, man dreams, the work is born.”

Fernando Pessoa book Mensagem

Poem "O Infante", verse 1.
Message
Original: Deus quer, o homem sonha, a obra nasce.

“If we knew the truth, we'd see it; all else is system and outskirts.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Ibid., p. 106
The Book of Disquiet
Original: Se conhecêssemos a verdade, vê-la-íamos; tudo o mais é sistema e arrabaldes.

“I will be what I want. But I will have to want what I'll be. Success is in having success, not conditions for success.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Ibid., p. 122
The Book of Disquiet
Original: Serei o que quiser. Mas tenho que querer o que for. O êxito está em ter êxito, e não em ter condições de êxito.

“It's in an inland sea that the river of my life ended.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Ibid.
The Book of Disquiet
Original: Foi num mar interior que o rio da minha vida findou.

“Who doesn't feel commands. He who only thinks what is required in order to win, wins.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Ibid., p. 260
The Book of Disquiet
Original: Manda quem não sente. Vence quem pensa só o que precisa para vencer.

“Nature is the difference between the soul and God.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Ibid., p. 150
The Book of Disquiet
Original: A natureza é a diferença entre a alma e Deus.

“I never go to where's a risk. I'm frightened of dangers down to boredom.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Ibid., p. 96
The Book of Disquiet
Original: Nunca vou para onde há risco. tenho medo a tédio dos perigos.

“Who wants to go beyond the Bojador
Must go beyond pain.”

Fernando Pessoa book Mensagem

Poem "Mar Português", Verses 9-10
Message
Original: Quem quer passar além do Bojador
Tem que passar além da dor.

“I have found out that reading is a slavish sort of dreaming. If I must dream, why not my own dreams?”

Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) Portuguese poet, writer, literary critic, translator, publisher and philosopher

Descobri que a leitura é uma forma servil de sonhar. Se tenho de sonhar, porque não sonhar os meus próprios sonhos?
Apontamentos pessoais ["Autobiographical Notes"] (1910)

“In today's life, the world belongs only to the stupid, the insensitive and the agitated. The right to live and triumph is now conquered almost by the same means by which you conquer internment in an asylum: the inability to think, amorality and hiperexcitation.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Ibid., p. 173
The Book of Disquiet
Original: Na vida de hoje, o mundo só pertence aos estúpidos, aos insensíveis e aos agitados. O direito a viver e a triunfar conquista-se hoje quase pelos mesmos processos por que se conquista o internamento num manicómio: a incapacidade de pensar, a amoralidade e a hiperexcitação.

“I sleep and I unsleep. On the other side of me, beyond where I lie down, the silence of the house touches infinity. I hear time falling, drop by drop, and no falling drop is heard falling.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Ibid., p. 59
The Book of Disquiet
Original: Durmo e desdurmo.
Do outro lado de mim, lá para trás de onde jazo, o silêncio da casa toca no infinito. Oiço cair o tempo, gota a gota, e nenhuma gota que cai se ouve cair.

“Love is essential. Sex, a mere accident.”

Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) Portuguese poet, writer, literary critic, translator, publisher and philosopher

O amor é que é essencial.
O sexo é só um acidente.
Poem (5 April 1935), reported in Poesias inéditas (1930-1935), p. 192

“I'm a keeper of [[sheep.
The sheep are my thoughts. ]]I'm a keeper of sheep.
The sheep are my thoughts
And each thought a sensation.
I think with my eyes and my ears
And with my hands and feet
And with my nose and mouth.To think a flower is to see and smell it,
And to eat a fruit is to know its meaning.That is why on a hot day
When I enjoy it so much I feel sad,
And I lie down in the grass
And close my warm eyes,
Then I feel my whole body lying down in reality,
I know the truth, and I'm happy.</p”

Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) Portuguese poet, writer, literary critic, translator, publisher and philosopher

Sou um guardador de rebanhos.
O rebanho é os meus pensamentos
E os meus pensamentos são todos sensações.
Penso com os olhos e com os ouvidos
E com as mãos e os pés
E com o nariz e a boca.
Pensar uma flor é vê-la e cheirá-la
E comer um fruto é saber-lhe o sentido.Por isso quando num dia de calor
Me sinto triste de gozá-lo tanto,
E me deito ao comprido na erva,
E fecho os olhos quentes,
Sinto todo o meu corpo deitado na realidade,
Sei a verdade e sou feliz.
Alberto Caeiro (heteronym), O Guardador de Rebanhos ("The Keeper of Sheep"), IX — in A Little Larger Than the Entire Universe, trans. Richard Zenith (Penguin, 2006)

“The blighter that is at the end of the sea
On the pitch-black night raised itself flying;
Round the vessel it flew three times,
Three times it flew creaking,
And said, 'Who dared pierce
Into my dens that I do not reveal,
My black ceilings of the end of the world?'
And the helmsman said, trembling,
'His Majesty King John the Second!'

'Whose sails are these then which I rub against?
Whose the keels I see and hear?'
Said the blighter, and rolled three times,
Three times it rolled filthy and bulky,
'Who attempts what is solely my power,
I who abide where no one ever could see me
And who drip the fears of the depthless sea?'
And the helmsman trembled, and said,
'His Majesty King John the Second!'

Three times he raised his hands from the helm,
Three times he had them rooted on the helm,
And said after trembling three times,
'Here at the helm I am more than myself:
I am a People who wants the sea that is yours;
And more than the blighter, that my soul fears
And rolls on the darkness of the end of the world,
Orders the will, that ties me at the helm,
Of His Majesty King John the Second!'”

Fernando Pessoa book Mensagem

Poem "O Mostrengo" http://www.inverso.pt/Mensagem/MarPortugues/mostrengo.htm, lines 1–9, trans. Charles Eglington ( Listen to the poem on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5Ihd-ECpYM) Message

“Not pleasure, not glory, not power: freedom, only freedom.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Ibid., p. 62
The Book of Disquiet
Original: Não o prazer, não a glória, não o poder: a liberdade, unicamente a liberdade.

“Having touched Christ's feet is not an excuse for punctuation mistakes.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

A Factless Autobiography, Richard Zenith Edition, Lisbon, 2006, p 229
The Book of Disquiet
Original: O ter tocado os pés de Cristo não é desculpa para defeitos de pontuação.

“By the painful light of the factory’s huge electric lamps
I write in a fever.
I write gnashing my teeth, rabid for the beauty of all this,
For this beauty completely unknown to the ancients.

O wheels, O gears, eternal r-r-r-r-r-r-r!
Bridled convulsiveness of raging mechanisms!
Raging in me and outside me,
Through all my dissected nerves,
Through all the papillae of everything I feel with!
My lips are parched, O great modern noises,
From hearing you at too close a range,
And my head burns with the desire to proclaim you
In an explosive song telling my every sensation,
An explosiveness contemporaneous with you, O machines!”

Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) Portuguese poet, writer, literary critic, translator, publisher and philosopher

À dolorosa luz das grandes lâmpadas eléctricas da fábrica
Tenho febre e escrevo.
Escrevo rangendo os dentes, fera para a beleza disto,
Para a beleza disto totalmente desconhecida dos antigos.Ó rodas, ó engrenagens, r-r-r-r-r-r-r eterno!
Forte espasmo retido dos maquinismos em fúria!
Em fúria fora e dentro de mim,
Por todos os meus nervos dissecados fora,
Por todas as papilas fora de tudo com que eu sinto!
Tenho os lábios secos, ó grandes ruídos modernos,
De vos ouvir demasiadamente de perto,
E arde-me a cabeça de vos querer cantar com um excesso
De expressão de todas as minhas sensações,
Com um excesso contemporâneo de vós, ó máquinas!
Álvaro de Campos (heteronym), Ode Triunfal ["Triumphal Ode"] (1914), in A Little Larger Than the Entire Universe, trans. Richard Zenith (Penguin, 2006)

“I reread? I lied! I don't dare to reread. I cannot reread. What's the point, for me, in rereading?”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Ibid.
The Book of Disquiet
Original: Releio? Menti! Não ouso reler. Não posso reler. De que me serve reler?

“Ah, the freshness in the face of leaving a task undone!
To be remiss is to be positively out in the country!
What a refuge it is to be completely unreliable!
I can breathe easier now that the appointments are behind me.
I missed them all, through deliberate negligence,
Having waited for the urge to go, which I knew wouldn't come.
I'm free, and against organised, clothed society.
I'm naked and plunge into the water of my imagination.
It's too late to be at either of the two meetings where I should have been at the same time,
Deliberately at the same time…
No matter, I'll stay here dreaming verses and smiling in italics.
This spectator aspect of life is so amusing!
I can't even light the next cigarette… If it's an action,
It can wait for me, along with the others, in the non-meeting called life.”

Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) Portuguese poet, writer, literary critic, translator, publisher and philosopher

Ah a frescura na face de não cumprir um dever!
Faltar é positivamente estar no campo!
Que refúgio o não se poder ter confiança em nós!
Respiro melhor agora que passaram as horas dos encontros,
Faltei a todos, com uma deliberação do desleixo,
Fiquei esperando a vontade de ir para lá, que'eu saberia que não vinha.
Sou livre, contra a sociedade organizada e vestida.
Estou nu, e mergulho na água da minha imaginação.
E tarde para eu estar em qualquer dos dois pontos onde estaria à mesma hora,
Deliberadamente à mesma hora...
Está bem, ficarei aqui sonhando versos e sorrindo em itálico.
É tão engraçada esta parte assistente da vida!
Até não consigo acender o cigarro seguinte... Se é um gesto,
Fique com os outros, que me esperam, no desencontro que é a vida.
Álvaro de Campos (heteronym), "A Frescura" (1929), in Fernando Pessoa & Co: Selected Poems, trans. Richard Zenith (Grove Press, 1998)

“I'm upset by the happiness of all these men who don't know they're unhappy. […] Because of that, though, I love them all. Dear vegetables!”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Ibid., p. 266
The Book of Disquiet
Original: Irrita-me a felicidade de todos estes homens que não sabem que são infelizes.[...] Por isto, contudo, amo-os a todos. Meus queridos vegetais!