35 Sonnets by Fernando Pessoa

Fernando António Nogueira Pessoa was born on June 13, 1888, in Lisbon, Portugal. In 1896, Fernando sailed to South Africa with his mother to join his stepfather, a consul in Durban. There, he received his education at the St. Joseph Convent School, run by Irish and French nuns. In 1899, Fernando moved to the Durban High School and quickly became fluent in English. He also developed an appreciation for English literature- so much so that he was awarded the Queen Victoria Memorial Prize for best paper in English during his university exam. In 1904, the Natal Mercury published his poem "Hillier did first usurp the realms of rhyme" under the pseudonym C.R. Anon. In December of that same year, the Durban High School Magazine published his poem, Macaulay. In 1905, The Natal Mercury published four of his sonnets, all under anonymous pseudonyms, giving him a taste for publication. However, Fernando returned to Lisbon in 1905 to study diplomacy, but a combination of illness and political unrest ended his formal education. In 1907, he was a practitioner at R.G. Dun & Company, an American mercantile information agency. When his grandfather died that September, Fernando used his inheritance to set up his own publishing house, the Empreza Ibis, but it wasn't successful and closed down in 1910. In 1912, Fernando Pessoa entered the literary world with a critical essay that triggered one of the most important literary debates of the Portuguese intellectual world. He founded an art journal, Athena, in 1924, where he published verses under the pseudonyms Alberto Caeiro and Ricardo Reis. He also worked as a freelance commercial translator while diving into life as a writer, literary critic, and political analyst. During this time, Fernando contributed to 32 journals and newspapers In 1925, he wrote an English guidebook to Lisbon, but it went unpublished until 1992. In 1935, Fernando Pessoa entered the hospital complaining of abdominal pain and fever. He then wrote his last words- "I know not what tomorrow will bring." He died the next day, on November 30, 1935, at the young age of 47. Critics dispute the cause of death, but the two most common ideas are cirrhosis of the liver or pancreatitis- both caused by Fernando's love of drink. Fernando Pessoa contributed hundreds of works to the Portuguese and English literary scene, and he remains an influential figure in Lisbon culture. We are reading from 35 Sonnets, a collection of English poetry published in 1918. To learn more about this author and his works, click the link above or visit his Wikipedia page!