Quote

Inch by inch I conquered the inner terrain I was born with. Bit by bit I reclaimed the swamp in which I'd languished. I gave birth to my infinite being, but I had to wrench myself out of me with forceps.

Fernando Pessoa

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Fernando Pessoa
Age: 47 †
Born: 1888
Born: June 13
Died: 1935
Died: November 30
Author
Essayist
Literary Critic
Philosopher
Playwright
Poet
Prosaist
Translator
Writer
Lisboa
Fernando António Nogueira Pessoa
Fernando Antonio Nogueira Pessoa
Alberto Caeiro
Ricardo Reis
Bernardo Soares
Pessoa
Birth
Swamps
Bits
Terrain
Born
Conquered
Inch
Inches
Reclaimed
Inner
Wrench
Infinite
Wrenches
Gave
Swamp

More quotes by Fernando Pessoa

Image
THIRD WATCHER Let her speak. Don't interrupt. She knows words that mermaids taught her...I'm falling asleep in order to hear her...Go on, sister, go on...My heart aches because I wasn't you when you dreamed at the seashore.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
pg 9, The consciousness of life's unconsciousness is the oldest tax levied on the intelligence.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
Blessed are those who entrust their lives to no one.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
Every gesture is a revolutionary act.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
But my sadness is comforting Because it’s right and natural And because it’s what the soul should feel When it already thinks it exists And the hand pick flowers And the soul takes no notice.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
I'm sick of everything, and of the everythingness of everything.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
We worship perfection because we can't have it if we had it, we would reject it. Perfection is inhuman, because humanity is imperfect.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
We never love anyone. What we love is the idea we have of someone. It's our own concept—our own selves—that we love.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
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
Image
My past is everything I failed to be.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
Multipliquei-me para me sentir.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
I don't mourn the loss of my childhood I mourn because everything, including (my) childhood, is lost.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
I take with me the conscience of defeat as a victory banner.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
The human soul is an abyss
Fernando Pessoa
Image
It's been a long time since I've been me.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
Man shouldn't be able to see his own face. That's what's most terrible. Nature gave him the possibility of not seeing it, as well as the incapacity of not seeing his own eyes.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
But I am not perfect in my way of putting things Because I lack the divine simplicity Of being only what I appear to be.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
To know nothing about yourself is to live. To know yourself badly is to think.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
I feel as if I'm always on the verge of waking up.
Fernando Pessoa
Image
The essence of what I desire is simply this: to sleep away life.
Fernando Pessoa