A critical biography of the modernist Portuguese writer. As a young man Fernando Pessoa aspired to, as he put it, “be plural like the universe.” He would fulfill this desire by inventing over one hundred fictional alter-egos which he called heteronyms. Beginning with Pessoa’s early days in Portugal, this philosophical biography explores the life, work, and imaginative universe of this modernist pioneer. Bartholomew Ryan offers a detailed overview of Pessoa’s writings on radical politics, his ventures into esoteric realms, and his expertise in astrology. Along the way, Ryan unravels Pessoa’s real and literary relationships and explores his unfinished prose masterpiece,
The Book of Disquiet. This is a compelling, timely exploration of Pessoa’s profound, innovative ideas.
Bartholomew Ryanis a philosopher, musician, and researcher based at IFILNOVA, New University of Lisbon. His books include the coedited
Fernando Pessoa and Philosophy: Countless Lives Inhabit Us.
"This is a brilliant, knowledgeable, and original presentation of the multitudinous poet Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935). . . With deep knowledge of Pessoa’s life and archive, Ryan connects fragments, themes, and ideas drawn throughout a life of literature and imagination. His is the most accessible and profound presentation of Pessoa to date, a concise yet expansive and illuminating intellectual biography, written in a clear and readable style. . . . Highly recommended."
"More than presenting a concise life story of Portugal’s most fascinating writer of recent centuries, Bartholomew Ryan draws illuminating connections between the self-described 'poet animated by philosophy' and thinkers as diverse as Lenin, Kierkegaard, Gandhi, Nietzsche, Yeats, Eliot, Heidegger, Magris, Joyce and Clarice Lispector. It’s a joyous ride through a wild world of ideas, literary experiments anl£2
![Fernando Pessoa [Paperback]](/itemImage/2/1/1/0/2_6859711.jpg "Fernando Pessoa [Paperback]")