Fernando Pessoa Quotes - Page 5

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I'm astounded whenever I finish something. Astounded and distressed. My perfectionist instinct should inhibit me from finishing; it should inhibit me from even beginning. But I get distracted and start doing something. What I achieve is not the product of an act of my will but of my will's surrender. I begin because I don't have the strength to think; I finish because I don't have the courage to quit. This book is my cowardice.

Fernando Pessoa

Book, Writing, Thinking

"The Book of Disquiet".

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I want to be a work of art, at least in my soul, since I can’t be one in my body.

Fernando Pessoa

Art, Soul, Body

Fernando Pessoa (1996). “The Book of Disquietude: By Bernardo Soares, Assistant Bookkeeper in the City of Lisbon”

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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.

Fernando Pessoa

Mean, Rays, Demand

Fernando Pessoa (2007). “The Selected Prose of Fernando Pessoa”, p.321, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

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Ah, what a morning this is, awakening me to life's stupidity. [98 - Zenith trans.]

Fernando Pessoa

Morning, Stupidity, Zenith

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My joy is as painful as my pain.

Fernando Pessoa

Pain, Joy, Painful

"The Book of Disquiet". Book by Fernando Pessoa (1982). Translated by Richard Zenith, p. 100, 2006.

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To be great, be whole; Exclude nothing, exaggerate nothing that is not you. Be whole in everything. Put all you are Into the smallest thing you do. So, in each lake, the moon shines with splendor Because it blooms up above.

Fernando Pessoa

Inspirational, Moon, Lakes

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The unnatural and the strange have a perfume of their own

Fernando Pessoa

Strange, Perfume, Unnatural

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Friends: not one. Just a few acquaintances who imagine they feel something for me and who might be sorry if a train ran over me and the funeral was on a rainy day.

Fernando Pessoa

Sorry, Rainy Day, Funeral

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Better to dream than to be.

Fernando Pessoa

Dream

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I am tired of myself in every way. All things, deep down to the secret of their roots, are stained by the color of my weariness.

Fernando Pessoa

Tired, Color, Roots

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Should I be what I think? But I think about being so many things!

Fernando Pessoa

Thinking, Book Of Disquiet

"The Collected Poems of Álvaro de Campos: 1928-1935".

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In this metallic age of barbarians, only a relentless cultivation of our ability to dream, to analyse and to captivate can prevent our personality from degenerating into nothing or else into a personality like all the rest.

Fernando Pessoa

Dream, Personality, Age

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Oh salty sea, how much of your salt Is tears from Portugal?

Fernando Pessoa

Sea, Tears, Portugal

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The essence of what I desire is simply this: to sleep away life.

Fernando Pessoa

Sleep, Essence, Desire

Fernando Pessoa (1996). “The Book of Disquietude: By Bernardo Soares, Assistant Bookkeeper in the City of Lisbon”

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Without madness what is man But a wholesome beast, Postponed corpse that begets?

Fernando Pessoa

Men, Madness, Beast

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The superiority of the dreamer is that dreaming is much more practical than living, and that the dreamer extracts from life a much vaster and varied pleasure than the action man. In better and more direct words, the dreamer is the real action man.

Fernando Pessoa

Dream, Real, Men

"The Book of Disquiet". Book by Fernando Pessoa, p.110, 1982.

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My soul's the present shadow of a presence gone.

Fernando Pessoa

Soul, Shadow, Gone

Fernando Pessoa (1974). “Selected Poems”

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To have opinions is to sell out to youself. To have no opinions is to exist. To have every opinion is to be a poet.

Fernando Pessoa

Opinion, Poet, Book Of Disquiet

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There's a tiredness of abstract inteligence, and it's the most horrible of tirednesses. It doesn't weight on you like the tiredness of the body, nor does it worry you like the tiredness of knowledge and emotion. It's a weightiness of the conscience of the world, an inability of the soul to breathe.

Fernando Pessoa

Worry, Soul, Inability

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

Fernando Pessoa

Ifs

"The Book of Disquiet". Book by Fernando Pessoa, p.106, 1982.

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We live by action—by acting on desire. Those of us who don't know how to want—whether geniuses or beggars—are related by impotence.

Fernando Pessoa

Desire, Acting, Genius

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I carry my awareness of defeat like a banner of victory.

Fernando Pessoa

Victory, Defeat, Awareness

Fernando Pessoa (2002). “The Book of Disquiet”, p.74, Penguin UK

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I sometimes think that I enjoy suffering. But the truth is I would prefer something else.

Fernando Pessoa

Thinking, Suffering, Sometimes

Fernando Pessoa (2010). “The Book of Disquiet”, p.190, Profile Books

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For I am the size of what I see / not my height's size.

Fernando Pessoa

Height, Size

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Let's buy books so as not to read them; let's go to concerts without caring to hear the music or see who's there; let's take long walks because we're sick of walking; and let's spend whole days in the country, just because it bores us.

Fernando Pessoa

Country, Book, Caring

Fernando Pessoa (2002). “The Book of Disquiet”, p.49, Penguin UK

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Fernando Pessoa

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Born: June 13, 1888
Died: November 30, 1935
Occupation: Poet
Cite this Page: Citation

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