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Fernando Pessoa

Fernando Pessoa Quotes

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Famous Fernando Pessoa Quotes

“I am the outskirts of some non-existent town, the long-winded prologue to an unwritten book. I'm nobody, nobody. I don't know how to feel or think or love. I'm a character in a novel as yet unwritten, hovering in the air and undone before I've even existed, amongst the dreams of someone who never quite managed to breath life into me.”

ThinkingKnowsFeelsLongBookCharacterDreamNovelKnow HowAirTownsBreathsNever QuitUndoneUnwrittenHoveringBook Of DisquietPrologue
Book:The Book of Disquiet
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“Each of us is several, is many,is a profusion of selves. So that the self who disdains his surroundings is not the same as the self who suffers or takes joy in them. In the vast colony of our being there are many species of people who think and feel in different ways. Livro Do Desassossego”

PeopleThinkingWayFeelsDifferentSelfJoySufferingSpeciesDifferent WaysSurroundingsBeing ThereColonyDisdain
Book:The Selected Prose of Fernando Pessoa
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“Walking on these streets, until the night falls, my life feels to me like the life they have. By day they’re full of meaningless activity; by night, they’re full of meaningless lack of it. By day I am nothing, and by night I am I. There is no difference between me and these streets, save they being streets and I a soul, which perhaps is irrelevant when we consider the essence of things”

FeelsSoulNightFallDifferencesStreetsWalkingActivityEssenceMeaninglessIrrelevantThese Streets
Author:Fernando Pessoa
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“When all by myself, I can think of all kinds of clever remarks, quick comebacks to what no one said, and flashes of witty sociability with nobody. But all of this vanishes when I face someone in the flesh: I lose my intelligence, I can no longer speak, and after half an hour I just feel tired. Talking to people makes me feel like sleeping. Only my ghostly and imaginary friends, only the conversations I have in my dreams, are genuinely real and substantial.”

PeopleThinkingFeelsKindSaidI CanRealDreamFacesSpeakHoursLosesSleepHalfTalkingConversationTiredWittyFleshCleverAll KindsImaginaryFlashRemarksComebackSociabilityImaginary FriendBook Of Disquiet
Book:The Book of Disquiet
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“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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“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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“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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“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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“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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