Sadly I write in my quiet room, alone as I have always been, alone as I will always be. And I wonder if my apparently negligible voice might not embody the essence of thousands of voices, the longing for self expression of thousands of lives, the patience of millions of souls resigned like my own to their daily lot, their useless dreams, and their hopeless hopes.
Interpretation
This quote reflects the profound isolation and yearning for self-expression felt by many individuals.
Fernando Pessoa's quote delves into the existential solitude experienced in creative endeavors, suggesting that the quiet, personal reflections of an individual can resonate with the collective struggles and aspirations of countless others. It highlights the contrast between an individual's loneliness and the shared human desire for expression, ultimately implying that one's voice, no matter how small, holds significance in the tapestry of human experience.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about the importance of pursuing one's passions despite feeling alone.
I have at this moment so many fundamental thoughts, so many truly metaphysical things to say, that I suddenly get tired and decide not to write any more, not to think any more, but to allow the fever of speaking to make me sleepy, and with my eyes closed, like a cat, I play with everything I could have said.
It's been months since I last wrote. I've lived in a state of mental slumber, leading the life of someone else. I've felt, very often, a vicarious happiness. I haven't existed. I've been someone else. I've lived without thinking.
We all have two lives: The true, the one we dreamed of in childhood And go on dreaming of as adults in a substratum of mist; the false, the one we love when we live with others, the practical, the useful, the one we end up by being put in a coffin.
I'm a man for whom the outside world is an inner Reality.
My dreams are a stupid refuge, like an umbrella against a thunderbolt.
The chill of what I won't feel gnaws at my present heart.
No human beings more dangerous than those who have suffered for a belief: the great persecutors are recruited from the martyrs not quite beheaded. Far from diminishing the appetite for power, suffering exasperates it.
Aphrodite-Venus had become not a subject of adoration, but an agent of exploitation. From the moment Christian society perceived sex not as a gift of the goddess but a crime against God himself, women were believed to be the vessels of love's malign power.
Thus to share in the sufferings of Christ is, at the same time, to suffer for the kingdom of God. In the eyes of the just God, before his judgment. Those who share in the sufferings of Christ become worthy of this kingdom.
People can have the Model T in any color – so long as it’s black.
There are always interests that are furthered by war. Therefore, those who have power and influence can also stop them... we should not accept any excuses from those in power.
I was trained to be an actor, not a star. I was trained to play roles, not to deal with fame and agents and lawyers and the press.
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