Quick summary of how remarkable this is:

Fernando Pessoa invented characters for his poetry. The characters are not in his poems, but are the writers of the poems. Alvaro de Campos is one of them.

These characters are incredibly well-developed. They each have full and rich biographies, writing styles, and philosophical approaches to life. They also have interactions with each other, occasionally even engaging in literary flame wars. I don't think there is anything like these works anywhere else in literature.

Anyone who enjoys Pessoa may also enjoy a book[1] by the Nobel-winning Portuguese author Jose Saramago, in which one of Pessoa's characters must travel back to Portugal, to attend Pessoa's funeral.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Year_of_the_Death_of_Ric...

I always found it interesting how he went about his multiple personas.

"How do I write in the name of these three? Caeiro, through sheer and unexpected inspiration, without knowing or even suspecting that I’m going to write in his name. Ricardo Reis, after an abstract meditation, which suddenly takes concrete shape in an ode. Campos, when I feel a sudden impulse to write and don’t know what. (My semi-heteronym Bernardo Soares, who in many ways resembles Álvaro de Campos, always appears when I'm sleepy or drowsy, so that my qualities of inhibition and rational thought are suspended; his prose is an endless reverie. He’s a semi-heteronym because his personality, although not my own, doesn’t differ from my own but is a mere mutilation of it. He’s me without my rationalism and emotions. His prose is the same as mine, except for certain formal restraint that reason imposes on my own writing, and his Portuguese is exactly the same – whereas Caeiro writes bad Portuguese, Campos writes it reasonably well but with mistakes such as "me myself" instead of "I myself", etc.., and Reis writes better than I, but with a purism I find excessive...)"

(he has many more minor heteronyms and pseudonyms) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa#Heteronyms

> Reis writes better than I, but with a purism I find excessive

It's really wrinkling my brain to think of an author's character being a "better" writer than the author himself. Although, wrinkles aside, I suppose this effect could be achieved via the editing process; edit the "character's" writings with more time and care than one's own writing.

Yeah, that detail. Maybe on given days, or under or over the influence, he might more readily have been open to it, or as an intentional endeavour to express himself in different ways.

I think that although contrary to external appearances people are never singly defined - we all have different psychologies and facets, some that we consciously or unconsciously embrace or expound in given situations others that we consciously or unconsciously repress or try to tame, without needing to be (innately) something extreme or unhealthy - that's why I like that aspect of his work, it just runs with it.

He also says "so that my qualities of inhibition and rational thought are suspended", so he basically thinks of "inhibition" and "rational thought" as valuable (and/or higher value than other qualities, probably given his usual day to day work and education) - but his actual "work" - the thing by which he is remembered and valued - seems to be an attempt to break from those "qualities".

> he basically thinks of "inhibition" and "rational thought" as valuable (and/or higher value than other qualities, probably given his usual day to day work and education) - but his actual "work" - the thing by which he is remembered and valued - seems to be an attempt to break from those "qualities".

I think you've just sketched Pessoa's theory of creativity.

I'm not well versed when it comes to poetry, but I happen to have read a lot of Pessoa's work (mostly Álvaro de Campos) and it is very touching. I'd go as far to say that it's worth learning Portuguese (a very hard language) just so you can read Pessoa's texts without the translation.

My personal favorite is Tabacaria [0] (Tobacco Shop). That's a masterpiece.

[0] - https://www.azores-adventures.com/2015/10/tabacaria-by-ferna...

> Portuguese (a very hard language)

Hard to learn? For whom? A native Japanese speaker? English? Swahili?

The foreign service institute of the US department of state classifies Portuguese as a category I language (easiest to learn for English native speakers):

https://www.state.gov/foreign-language-training/

I feel like native English speakers who've learned Spanish tend to think of Portuguese as hard because it has more phonemes (and accented letter forms) than Spanish and (arguably) more grammar in terms of verb forms (e.g. mesoclitics and personal infinitives). This is especially when Spanish is their point of reference, or their only point of reference.

But I think the Foreign Service Institute is right and there's good reason, both theoretically and experimentally, to consider Portuguese comparatively easy for native English speakers!

It's absolutely amazing, though I've gotta say I kinda developed an aversion to Pessoa after it being crammed down our throats all the time in high school x)

Well, for me it was what made love the classes. I guess the teacher has a big influence here.

I recommend everyone to read “The Book of Disquiet” by Bernardo Soares, a semi-heteronym of Fernando Pessoa.

Pessoa has been a lingering influence on my own work (which is visual as opposed to the written word) since I was a teenager. Growing up in America to Portuguese immigrants meant I always had a curiosity about it, and Pessoa always stuck as something utterly strange and unique.

I will definitely read the author. But the Wikipedia article is written in a strangely disturbing style - it feels as though I am listening to one side of a loud argument at a frat party.

problem with pessoa was he was not original. most of his work looks like aesthetic studies of past thinkers/poets. most portuguese-speaking people praise his work and name just because that's what the social algorithm fed them. more or less the same happens with Machado de Assis, although Machado is much better at clickbaiting

Both Pessoa and Machado de Assis are praised outside of Portugal/Brazil, so it's hardly a nationalistic thing.

nah they don't really mean anything for the development of Literature or thought, their importance is only regional and all they did was import style and content into portuguese.

“The Message” is Pessoa’s masterpiece.

Ricardo Reis

The second half of “Odes” is beautiful (trans. Edouard Roditi):

>> To be great, be whole: nothing that's you

Should you exaggerate or exclude. In each thing, be all. Give all you are

In the least you ever do.

The whole moon, because it rides so high,

Is reflected in each pool. <<