The Book of Disquiet

By Fernando Pessoa

Book Overview

The prizewinning, complete and unabridged translation--"the best English-language version we are likely to see for a long time, if ever" (The Guardian)--of a work of unclassifiable genius: the crowning achievement of Portugal's modern master

Edited, Translated, and with an Introduction by Richard Zenith, the author of the Pulitzer Prize finalist Pessoa: A Biography

Winner of the Calouste Gulbenkian Translation Prize for Portuguese Translation

A Penguin Classic

Fernando Pessoa was many writers in one. He attributed his prolific writings to a wide range of alternate selves, each of which had a distinct biography, ideology, and horoscope. When he died in 1935, Pessoa left behind a trunk filled with unfinished and unpublished writings, among which were the remarkable pages that make up his posthumous masterpiece, The Book of Disquiet, an astonishing work that, in George Steiner's words, "gives to Lisbon the haunting spell of Joyce's Dublin or Kafka's Prague."

Published for the first time some fifty years after his death, this unique collection of short, aphoristic paragraphs comprises the "autobiography" of Bernardo Soares, one of Pessoa's alternate selves. Part intimate diary, part prose poetry, part descriptive narrative, captivatingly translated by Richard Zenith, The Book of Disquiet is one of the greatest works of the twentieth century.

"Pessoa is a genius." --Andr? Aciman

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0141183047
• ISBN13: 9780141183046
• Release Date: December 2002
• Publisher: Penguin Classics
• Length: 544 Pages
• Weight: 0.85 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 5.0" x 7.6"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

The beauty of this novel

Poetry often speaks to us; we see something in it, something recognizable, and it's like we are shown a piece of ourselves that had been hidden for a lifetime before. Finding Pessoa's *Book of Disquiet* was like finding a piece of myself. In the pages of this poetic novel you will find honesty, often self-disparaging, and you will find beauty in the smallest observation. However, be forewarned, this is not a book that should be picked up with the idea of light reading in mind. In fact, you may find that you have to put it down, repeatedly, to get away from it, to think, but you will always, always come back to it. Keep it close to hand.

a master-priece from a tortured mind

there are few poets able to assume so many diferent personalites as Fernando Pessoa. But Bernardo Soares is not a diferent personality, is just the other side of his personnal mirror, an escape to his tortured soul. Probably that is why The Book of Disquiet is so universal, a portait of the human fears, an example of a lonely man,travelling across his own mind, looking at the world through the most ironic eyes. Fernando Pessoa was able to understand dissapointment and regreat in a intemporal way, as a natural part of human nature. So, this book has the ability to make you look inside yourself, guide by one of the best poets of all times!

A beautifully fine and unique book

Pessoa was a true acrobat of the imagination. The Book of Disquiet is a collection of epiphanic journal or diary prose kept by Pessoa and found decades after his death. The prose is truly some of the most gorgeous musings about everyday life and existence that any reader could ever find. The poet's world is laid out exquisitly and paradoxically for the entire benefit of those who read.I can't say I've ever found such beauty in the pages of a book before. If you like literature albeit simple or complex this book is something that you will immediately cherish for a very long time.