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The Terrible Paradox of Self-Awareness | Fernando Pessoa — Transcript

by Pursuit of Wonder · 2,118 words · 344 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:00this video is sponsored by blinkist
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0:09sometimes the story behind a work of art
0:11is just as fascinating as the work
0:13itself
0:15sometimes its origin is part of its
0:17content
0:18the story of 20th century writer
0:20Fernando passoa and his Masterwork the
0:23book of disquiet is one of those cases
0:25where the story behind it sounds like a
0:28work of fiction itself
0:31pasoa was born in 1888 in Lisbon
0:34Portugal at the early age of just five
0:36years old he was exposed to loss and
0:38impermanence when his father died of
0:40tuberculosis and then the following year
0:42his younger brother died
0:44not long after his mother remarried and
0:46his family moved to South Africa also
0:48taking from Fernando the landscape of
0:50his childhood
0:52while living in South Africa basso
0:54became fluent in English and developed
0:56an appreciation for English literature
0:58when he turned 17 he returned to Lisbon
1:01by himself where he would spend the rest
1:03of his life and dedicate most of his
1:05time to writing
1:07however by the time he died in 1935 at
1:10the age of 47 he had only published a
1:13few books that went mostly unnoticed and
1:16he essentially wrote in complete
1:17obscurity Unknown by anyone
1:20but yet he seemingly died knowing that
1:23he was a great literary figure or at the
1:26very least that he would likely become
1:28one
1:29and in an almost unsettling prophetic
1:31way
1:32he was right
1:35after his death pessoa's work the
1:38manuscript of the book of disquiet along
1:40with tens of thousands of other
1:41manuscript pages that are still to this
1:43day being edited remain tucked away in a
1:46wooden trunk Unknown by anyone
1:50it wasn't until 1982 47 years after
1:53pasoa died eerily the exact same age of
1:56pasoa when he died that the book of
1:58disquiet was found and published
2:02this book would go on to become what is
2:04widely regarded as one of the most
2:05unique and important literary works of
2:08the 20th century
2:10inside the book is a lifetime worth of
2:12basoa's Reflections and musings about
2:14reality and dreaming about tedium and
2:17selfhood about the absurdity of being
2:19and the futility of doing about the
2:22simultaneous complexity and simplicity
2:23of Life about the contradiction and
2:26Paradox at the core of everything
2:30the book is made up of a collection of
2:32fragmented vignettes written in a style
2:34somewhere between diary entries and
2:36poetry
2:37there is no real linear order to the
2:39book and it can arguably be experienced
2:41just as well backwards as forwards even
2:44more interesting but SOA does not claim
2:46to be the author of any of it rather it
2:49is credited to a man named Bernardo
2:50Suarez an assistant bookkeeper from
2:53Lisbon Portugal as well as possibly a
2:55man named Vicente gueres
2:57Juarez and soras however aren't real
3:01they are characters pesoa created to
3:03create the book found throughout the
3:06massive collection of all of pasoa's
3:08manuscript pages are various pseudonyms
3:10fictitious authors that he credits
3:12different pages and collections to these
3:15authors aren't just different pen names
3:16though they are different characters
3:18with different writing styles and
3:20personalities and Views and backstories
3:24pasoa referred to these author
3:25characters as heteronims and there were
3:28around 80 that he rode under throughout
3:29his lifetime
3:31thus the book of disquiet is not exactly
3:33a non-fiction book from an anonymous
3:35author but nor is it really a novel
3:37about a fictional character or story it
3:40is somewhere in between
3:42because of this it is often described as
3:44the weirdest autobiography ever written
3:46but SOA himself described it as a
3:49factless autobiography or an
3:52autobiography of someone who never
3:53existed
3:55the book's unique structure and style is
3:58in many ways an essential supporting leg
4:00of the book's themes the use of
4:02heteronim seems to reinforce a key
4:04philosophical theme throughout the work
4:06the fragmented and illusory nature of
4:08the self with Incredible accuracy and
4:11poignancy that feels cathartic to read
4:13throughout the book but SOA frequently
4:16describes the inherent alienation
4:18disorientation and loneliness associated
4:20with being a person he wrote I don't
4:24know how to feel or think or love I'm a
4:27character in a novel as yet Unwritten
4:29hovering in the air and undone before
4:31I've even existed amongst the dreams of
4:34someone who never quite managed to
4:35breathe life into me I'm always thinking
4:38always feeling but my thoughts lack all
4:40reason my emotions all feeling I'm
4:43falling through a trapdoor through
4:45Infinite Space in a directionless empty
4:48fall my soul is a black Maelstrom a
4:51great Madness spinning about a vacuum
4:52the swirling of a vast ocean around a
4:55hole in the void and in the waters more
4:57like whirlwinds than Waters float images
5:00of all I ever saw or heard in the world
5:02houses faces books boxes snatches of
5:06music and fragments of voices all caught
5:09up in a Sinister bottomless whirlpool
5:11and I I myself am the center that exists
5:15only because the geometry of the Abyss
5:17demands it I am the nothing around which
5:19all this spins I exist so that it can
5:22spin I am the center that exists only
5:25because every Circle has one
5:27for pesoa self-understanding or perhaps
5:31the attempt to understand the self is a
5:33free fall down a rabbit hole with the
5:34landing that kills you and the
5:36impossibility of understanding and
5:38communicating one's internal experiences
5:40while on this free fall lends itself to
5:43a lifetime of disquiet and
5:45disorientation
5:49throughout the book pasoa also often
5:51discusses themes of tedium futility and
5:53meaninglessness for him everything is a
5:56sort of delusion life is a sequence of
5:59Dreams
6:00I've never done anything but dream this
6:03and this alone has been the meaning of
6:04my life my only real concern has been my
6:07inner life but so wrote
6:10verbisoa there is no real point in doing
6:13or achieving anything reality as we
6:15experience it is as deluded and false
6:18and meaningful as the several dreams we
6:20had last night that dissolved upon
6:22awaking never to be known or thought of
6:24again
6:25life is but a dream destined to be coded
6:27over with the fog of Consciousness and
6:29forgotten upon the morning sunrise
6:32pasoa wrote If I write what I feel it's
6:35to reduce the fever of feeling what I
6:38confess is unimportant because
6:39everything is unimportant
6:43the recognition of the futility of doing
6:45anything and the advocation of receding
6:47into a dream world reinforces another
6:49major theme of the book contradiction
6:52and paradox
6:53after all why write about the
6:55pointlessness of doing anything and the
6:57impossibility of ever adequately saying
7:00anything while doing something and
7:02saying things perhaps however this does
7:05not speak to the incoherence of basoa
7:07but rather speaks to what pesoa might
7:09believe is useful in paradox
7:13in medicine certain preventative and
7:16preparation treatments contain forms of
7:18the bacteria or virus that cause the
7:20disease the treatment is used to prevent
7:23likewise arguably both creating and
7:26consuming good literature and good art
7:28expose you to the virus of being so you
7:31can hopefully develop enough immunity to
7:33survive
7:34perhaps paradoxically then the driving
7:37force that compelled pasoa to create and
7:39write and do was the awareness that
7:41creating and writing and doing is
7:44pointless
7:45it is also relevant to note that the
7:47book of disquiet was left unfinished
7:49with this it is almost as if the book
7:51mirrors besoa's philosophical conception
7:53of existence
7:55trapped inside a trunk only truly known
7:57after pasoa's death once it could no
7:59longer be changed by him interpreted
8:01only through a fragmented collection of
8:03vignettes written by someone who never
8:05existed finished by time not by
8:08intention the book itself seems to be an
8:10almost perfect metaphor for a person
8:14it is unsettling to consider all of this
8:16and then realize that the word pesoa his
8:19birth name translates in English into
8:22person
8:24if that's not enough perhaps the most
8:26confounding aspect of the book of
8:27disquiet story is that it contains
8:29passages that prophesize its fate
8:32in it pesoa wrote it sometimes occurs to
8:35me with sad Delight that if one day in a
8:38future I won't be part of the sentences
8:40I write are read and admired then at
8:43last I'll have my own kin people who
8:45understand me my true family and which
8:48to be born and loved but far from being
8:50born into it I'll have already died long
8:52ago I'll be understood only in effigy
8:55when affection can no longer compensate
8:57for the indifference that was the Dead
8:59Man's lot in life perhaps one day
9:02they'll understand that I fulfilled like
9:04no one else my instinctive duty to
9:06interpret a portion of our century and
9:08when they've understood that they'll
9:10write that in my time I was
9:11misunderstood that the people around me
9:13were unfortunately indifferent and
9:15insensitive to my work and that it was a
9:17Pity this happened to me and whoever
9:19writes this will fail to understand my
9:21literary counterpart in that future time
9:23just as my contemporaries don't
9:25understand me
9:26because men learn only what would be of
9:28use to their great grandparents the
9:31right way to live is something we can
9:32teach only the Dead
9:35and of course all of this came true
9:38it's happening right now with these
9:40words
9:41we are currently participating in
9:43pasoa's Fortune told by himself a
9:45century ago
9:46one can only Wonder was this a
9:48masterfully constructed plan by a genius
9:50creative mind was it chance was it both
9:53or was it something else
9:55whatever the case may be the story of
9:58the book of disquiet seems to have
9:59almost become a part of its artistic
10:00creation
10:01it elicits an almost metaphysical
10:03spiritual quality it feels like a
10:06religious book for atheists a manual for
10:08nihilists it can and probably will
10:11devastate most of those who read it
10:13but it will also help comfort and remind
10:15one to not take oneself or life too
10:18seriously
10:20sometimes exposure to the ailment is
10:23part of the treatment
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