Introduction vii
Notes on the Text and Translation xxvii
Acknowledgements xxxii
The Book Of Disquiet
Preface by Fernando Pessoa 3
A Factless Autobiography 9
A Disquiet Anthology 393
Appendix I: Texts Citing the Name of Vicente
Guedes 465
Appendix II: Two Letters 467
Appendix III: Reflections on The Book of Disquiet from Pessoa's
Writings 471
Notes 477
Table of Heteronyms 505
Fernando Pessoa (1888-1935) was born in Lisbon and brought up in Durban, South Africa. He returned to Lisbon in 1905. A prolific writer, ascribing his work to a variety of personas or heteronyms, Pessoa published little in his lifetime and supported himself by working as a commercial translator. Although acknowledged as an intellectual and a poet, his literary genius went largely unrecognised until after his death
“I can’t tell which of the three English-language editions
of The Book of Disquiet I’ve read . . . most accurately
conveys the style and spirit of Pessoa, but judging the English
alone, Zenith’s translation is most compelling. . . . I want Pessoa
to be as great as the version Zenith presents.” —Chris Power, New
Statesman
“A Modernist touchstone . . . no one has explored alternative
selves with Pessoa’s mixture of determination and abandon . . . In
a time which celebrates fame, success, stupidity, convenience and
noise, here is the perfect antidote, a hymn of praise to obscurity,
failure, intelligence, difficulty, and silence.” —The Daily
Telegraph
“His prose masterpiece . . . Richard Zenith has done an heroic job
in producing the best English-language version we are likely to see
for a long time, if ever.” —The Guardian
“The Book of Disquiet was left in a trunk which might never have
been opened. The gods must be thanked that it was. I love this
strange work of fiction and I love the inventive, hard-drinking,
modest man who wrote it in obscurity.” —Independent
“Fascinating, even gripping stuff . . . a strangely addictive
pleasure.” —Sunday Times
“Must rank as the supreme assault on authorship in modern European
literature . . . readers of Zenith’s edition will find it
supersedes all others in its delicacy of style, rigorous
scholarship and sympathy for Pessoa’s fractured sensibility . . .
the self-revelation of a disoriented and half-disintegrated soul
that is all the more compelling because the author himself is an
invention . . . Long before postmodernism became an academic
industry, Pessoa lived deconstruction.” —New Statesman
“Extraordinary . . . a haunting mosaic of dreams, autobiographical
vignettes, shards of literary theory and criticism and maxims.”
—The Observer
“Pessoa’s rapid prose, snatched in flight and restlessly
suggestive, remains haunting, often startling, like the touch of a
vibrating wire, elusive and persistent like the poetry . . . there
is nobody like him.” —The New York Review of Books
“This superb edition of The Book of Disquiet is . . . a
masterpiece.” —The Daily Telegraph
“I plan to use this book every year in my course at Yale. Thanks
for making it available.” —K. David Jackson, Yale
University
Recognized as Portugal's greatest poet since Camoens, Pessoa (1888-1935) wrote poetry under various heteronyms to whom he attributed biographies different from his own. Likewise, this rich and rewarding notebook kept by the solitary, celibate, and semi-alcoholic Pessoa during the last two decades of his life, is written under yet another heteronym (Bernardo Soares), a Lisbon bookkeeper with a position that is like a siesta and a salary that allows him to go on living. Soares knows no pleasure like that of books, yet he reads little. Like Camus, he is irritated by the happiness of men who don't know they are wretched, and his main objective is to perceive tedium in such a way that it ceases to hurt. There are no gossipy details in this heteronymous memoir, only the cerebral workings of a first-rate thinker on the dilemma of life. Full of fresh metaphors and unique perceptions, The Book of Disquiet can be casually scanned and read profitably even at random.-- Jack Shreve, Allegany Community Coll., Cumberland, Md.
"I can't tell which of the three English-language editions of
The Book of Disquiet I've read . . . most accurately conveys
the style and spirit of Pessoa, but judging the English alone,
Zenith's translation is most compelling. . . . I want Pessoa to be
as great as the version Zenith presents." -Chris Power, New
Statesman
"A Modernist touchstone . . . no one has explored alternative
selves with Pessoa's mixture of determination and abandon . . . In
a time which celebrates fame, success, stupidity, convenience and
noise, here is the perfect antidote, a hymn of praise to obscurity,
failure, intelligence, difficulty, and silence." -The Daily
Telegraph
"His prose masterpiece . . . Richard Zenith has done an heroic job
in producing the best English-language version we are likely to see
for a long time, if ever." -The Guardian
"The Book of Disquiet was left in a trunk which might never
have been opened. The gods must be thanked that it was. I love this
strange work of fiction and I love the inventive, hard-drinking,
modest man who wrote it in obscurity." -Independent
"Fascinating, even gripping stuff . . . a strangely addictive
pleasure." -Sunday Times
"Must rank as the supreme assault on authorship in modern European
literature . . . readers of Zenith's edition will find it
supersedes all others in its delicacy of style, rigorous
scholarship and sympathy for Pessoa's fractured sensibility . . .
the self-revelation of a disoriented and half-disintegrated soul
that is all the more compelling because the author himself is an
invention . . . Long before postmodernism became an academic
industry, Pessoa lived deconstruction." -New Statesman
"Extraordinary . . . a haunting mosaic of dreams, autobiographical
vignettes, shards of literary theory and criticism and maxims."
-The Observer
"Pessoa's rapid prose, snatched in flight and restlessly
suggestive, remains haunting, often startling, like the touch of a
vibrating wire, elusive and persistent like the poetry . . . there
is nobody like him." -The New York Review of Books
"This superb edition of The Book of Disquiet is . . . a
masterpiece." -The Daily Telegraph
"I plan to use this book every year in my course at Yale. Thanks
for making it available." -K. David Jackson, Yale
University
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