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Fernando Pessoa

Fernando Pessoa Quotes

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Famous Fernando Pessoa Quotes

“Once we're able to see this world as an illusion and a phantasm, then we can see everything that happens to us as a dream, as something that pretended to exist while we were sleeping. And we will become subtly and profoundly indifferent towards all of life's setbacks and calamities. Those who die turned a corner, which is why we've stopped seeing them; those who suffer pass before us like a nightmare, if we feel, or like an unpleasant daydream, if we think. And even our own suffering won't be more than this nothingness.”

IfsThinkingWorldFeelsDreamHappensAbleSufferingDiesSleepSeeingThis WorldIllusionCornersNightmareIndifferentNothingnessCalamityDaydreamingSetback
Author:Fernando Pessoa
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“Giving importance to what we think because we thought it, taking our own selves not only (to quote the Greek philosopher) as the measure of all things but as their norm or standard, we create in ourselves, if not an interpretation, at least a criticism of the universe, which we don't even know and therefore cannot criticize. The giddiest, most weak-minded of us then promote that criticism to an interpretation that's superimposed, like a hallucination; induced rather than deduced. It's a hallucination in the strict sense, being an illusion based on something only dimly seen.”

IfsThinkingKnowsGivingSelfUniverseStandardsIllusionAll ThingsCriticismWeakImportancePhilosopherGreekInterpretationCriticizeStrictNormHallucinationsGreek Philosopher
Book:The Education of the Stoic: The Only Manuscript of the Baron of Teive
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“And leaning out the window, enjoying the day above the varying volume of the entire city, only one thought swells my soul – the intimate will to die, to finish, not to see more light over any city, not to think, not to feel, to leave behind like wrapping paper the course of the sun and the days, to rid myself, at the edge of the grand bed, as of a heavy suit, of the involuntary effort to be.”

ThinkingFeelsSoulLightDiesCoursesEnjoyEffortCitiesBehindsSunBedPaperWindowEdgesHeavySuitsMy SoulIntimateVolumeInvoluntaryWrappingWrapping Paper
Author:Fernando Pessoa
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“Tomorrow I too – this feeling and thinking soul, the universe I am to myself – yes, tomorrow I too will be someone who no longer walks these streets, someone others will evoke with a vague: 'I wonder what's become of him?” And everything I do, everything I feel, everything I experience, will be just one less passer-by on the daily streets of some city or other.”

ThinkingFeelsSoulFeelingsUniverseWalksCitiesWonderStreetsTomorrowJust OneVagueEvokeBook Of Disquiet
Author:Fernando Pessoa
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“All I’ve ever done is dream. That, and only that, has been the meaning of my existence. The only thing I’ve ever really cared about is my inner life. My greatest griefs faded to nothing the moment I opened the window onto my inner self and lost myself in watching. I never tried to be anything other than a dreamer. I never paid any attention to people who told me to go out and live. I belonged always to whatever was far from me and to whatever I could never be. Anything that was not mine, however base, always seemed to be full of poetry. The only thing I ever loved was pure nothingness.”

PeopleHas BeensSelfDoneMomentsDreamLostGriefExistenceAttentionMinesPureWindowPaidDreamerNothingnessInner SelfInner LifeFadedLost Myself
Book:The Book of Disquiet
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“I read and am liberated. I acquire objectivity. I cease being myself and so scattered. And what I read, instead of being like a nearly invisible suit that sometimes oppresses me, is the external world’s tremendous and remarkable clarity, the sun that sees everyone, the moon that splotches the still earth with shadows, the wide expanses that end in the sea, the blackly solid trees whose tops greenly wave, the steady peace of ponds on farms, the terraced slopes with their paths overgrown by grape-vines.”

WorldStillsEndsSometimesEarthSunPathTreeSeaMoonShadowWaveWideInvisibleCeaseClaritySuitsAcquireRemarkableFarmsSteadyObjectivityLiberatedGrapesPondsVinesSlopesBeing MyselfExpanse
Author:Fernando Pessoa
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“For a long time now I haven't existed. I'm utterly calm. No one distinguishes me from who I am. I just felt myself breath as if I'd done something new, or done it late. I'm beginning to be conscious of being conscious. Perhaps tomorrow I will wake up to myself and resume the course of my existence. I don't know if that will make more happy or less. I don't know anything.”

IfsKnowsLongDoneCoursesFeltExistenceHavensTomorrowLateLong TimeConsciousWake UpBreathsCalmWho I AmSomething NewResumes
Book:The Book of Disquietude: By Bernardo Soares, Assistant Bookkeeper in the City of Lisbon
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“Man shouldn’t be able to see his own face – there’s nothing more sinister. Nature gave him the gift of not being able to see it, and of not being able to stare into his own eyes. Only in the water of rivers and ponds could he look at his face. And the very posture he had to assume was symbolic. He had to bend over, stoop down, to commit the ignominy of beholding himself. The inventor of the mirror poisoned the human heart.”

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Author:Fernando Pessoa
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“We may know that the work we continue to put off doing will be bad. Worse, however, is the work we never do. A work that’s finished is at least finished. It may be poor, but it exists, like the miserable plant in the lone flowerpot of my neighbour who’s crippled. That plant is her happiness, and sometimes it’s even mine. What I write, bad as it is, may provide some hurt or sad soul a few moments of distraction from something worse. That’s enough for me, or it isn’t enough, but it serves some purpose, and so it is with all of life.”

KnowsWritingMaySoulSometimesEnoughMomentsPurposeHurtPoorMinesPlantFinishedMiserableDistractionNeighbourLoneCrippledSad Soul
Author:Fernando Pessoa
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“I’ve always wanted to be liked. It grieved me that I was treated with indifference. Left an orphan by Fortune, I wanted—like all orphans—to be the object of someone’s affection. This need has always been a hunger that went unsatisfied, and so thoroughly have I adapted to this inevitable hunger that I sometimes wonder if I really feel the need to eat. Whatever be the case, life pains me.”

IfsNeedsFeelsSometimesWantedPainLeftWonderCasesObjectsFortuneHungerAffectionTreatedInevitableIndifferenceOrphanAdaptedUnsatisfiedPain In Life
Author:Fernando Pessoa
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“I asked for very little from life, and even this little was denied me. A nearby field, a ray of sunlight, a little bit of calm along with a bit of bread, not to feel oppressed by the knowledge that I exist, not to demand anything from others, and not to have others demand anything from me - this was denied me, like the spare change we might deny a beggar not because we're mean-hearted but because we don't feel like unbuttoning our coat.”

FeelsMeanLittlesMightBitsFieldsDemandLittle BitCalmDenyBreadRaysDeniedSunlightOppressedSparesCoatsHeartedBeggarSpare Change
Book:The Selected Prose of Fernando Pessoa
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“If, on thinking this, I look up to see if reality can quench my thirst, I see inexpressive facades, inexpressive faces, inexpressive gestures. Stones, bodies, ideas - all dead. All movements are one great standstill. Nothing means anything to me, not because it's unfamiliar but because I don't know what it is. The world has slipped away. And in the bottom of my soul - as the only reality of this moment - there's an intense and invisible grief, a sadness like the sound of someone crying in a dark room.”

IfsThinkingKnowsWorldLooksMeanIdeasSoulMomentsBodyRealityFacesSoundDarkRoomsGriefSadnessCryMovementStonesBottomInvisibleIntenseMy SoulLook UpGesturesThirstUnfamiliarFacadeQuenchDark RoomStandstill
Author:Fernando Pessoa
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“I suffer from life and from other people. I can’t look at reality face to face. Even the sun discourages and depresses me. Only at night and all alone, withdrawn, forgotten and lost, with no connection to anything real or useful — only then do I find myself and feel comforted.”

PeopleLifeFeelsLooksI CanRealRealityFacesNightSufferingLostSunConnectionsForgottenEmptinessDepressingDetachmentDiscouragingFace To FaceAll AloneNumbnessBook Of Disquiet
Book:The Book of Disquiet
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“I feel closer ties and more intimate bonds with certain characters in books, with certain images I’ve seen in engravings, than with many supposedly real people with the metaphysical absurdity known as ‘flesh and blood’. In fact, ‘flesh and blood’ describes them very well: they resemble cuts of meat laid out on the butcher’s marble slab, dead creatures bleeding as though still alive.”

PeopleFeelsWellsStillsBookRealCharacterFactsCertainKnownCuttingAliveBloodCreaturesFleshMeatTiesIntimateAbsurdityMetaphysicalMarbleBleedingButchersFlesh And BloodSlabs
Book:The Book of Disquiet
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“Sadly I write in my quiet room, alone as I have always been, alone as I will always be. And I wonder if my apparently negligible voice might not embody the essence of thousands of voices, the longing for self expression of thousands of lives, the patience of millions of souls resigned like my own to their daily lot, their useless dreams, and their hopeless hopes.”

IfsWritingSoulSelfDreamMightVoiceMy OwnRoomsWonderMillionsExpressionQuietEssenceLongingUselessHopelessSelf ExpressionResignedQuiet Room
Book:The Selected Prose of Fernando Pessoa
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“Silence emerges from the sound of rain and spreads in a crescendo of gray monotony over the narrow street I contemplate. I’m sleeping while awake, standing by the window, leaning against it as against everything. I search in myself for the sensations I feel before these falling threads of darkly luminous water that stand out from the grimy building facades and especially from the open windows. And I don’t know what I feel or what I want to feel. I don’t know what to think or where I am.”

ThinkingKnowsWantFeelsFallSoundWaterSleepSilenceStreetsBuildingRainStandingWindowSpreadAwakeSensationsGrayContemplatingThreadStanding OutLuminousFacadeMonotonyCrescendoNarrow StreetsSound Of Rain
Book:The Book of Disquiet
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“One or another man, liberated or cursed, suddenly sees-but even this man sees rarely-that all we are is what we aren't, that we fool ourselves about what's true and are wrong about what we conclude is right. And this man, who in a flash sees the universe naked, creates a philosophy or dreams up a religion; and the philosophy spreads and the religion propagates, and those who believe in the philosophy begin to wear it as a suit they don't see, and those who believe in the religion put it on as a mask they soon forget.”

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Author:Fernando Pessoa
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