I enjoy wording. Words for me are tangible bodies, visible sirens, incarnate sensualities.
Interpretation
The quote expresses the beauty and physicality of words, highlighting their ability to evoke emotions and sensations.
Fernando Pessoa's quote reflects a deep appreciation for the power of language. He perceives words not merely as abstract symbols but as vivid, corporeal entities that carry sensory experiences and emotional resonance. This perspective emphasizes the artistic and evocative qualities of words, suggesting that they can draw you in and create a tangible connection to thoughts and feelings.
In practice
This quote can be used in a poetry workshop to inspire participants to appreciate the depth of language.
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.
Jazz is not just 'Well, man, this is what I feel like playing.' It's a very structured thing that comes down from a tradition and requires a lot of thought and study.
When I'm making stuff, the thing that excites me most is not the result, but the process and trying to do something I've never done before.
I won't call my work entertainment. It's exploring. It's asking questions of people, constantly. 'How much do you feel? How much do you know? Are you aware of this? Can you cope with this?' A good movie will ask you questions you don't already know the answers to. Why would I want to make a film about something I already understand?
I see things with my own eyes, just as if they were the first eyes that ever saw, and then I set about to tell, as best I can, just what I've seen.
Everyone says you have to be a specialist, and if you conduct Wagner you cannot conduct Mozart - this is nonsense.
I would never, ever use a novel to do thinly disguised political information dissemination. For me, all these experiences, they sat in me, and they got broken down into my body, and I sweated it out. It's not because I want to talk about 'issues.' For me, a novel is a way of seeing the world.
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