{"title":"José Paulo Cavalcanti","description":"","products":[{"product_id":"fernando-pessoa-uma-quase-autobiografia-1","title":"Fernando Pessoa: An almost autobiography","description":"Fernando Pessoa: An Almost Autobiography is the most comprehensive reference work on the many personas assumed by the Portuguese poet. His heteronyms, many of them unknown to the general public, are revealed in José Paulo Cavalcanti's book with rich detail, presenting the production and origins of each of those who inhabited Fernando Pessoa's imagination and writing. Since his death in 1935, more than six thousand books have been published about the work of the Portuguese writer, but only three biographies exist (1950, published in Portugal; 1986, in Spain; and 1996, in France), in addition to a photobiography, which will be part of the exhibition. Fernando Pessoa died at the age of 47 and spent most of his life in Lisbon. His life, devoted entirely to art, awakened in Cavalcanti the desire to echo verses like that of his most famous figure, the poet Álvaro de Campos: \"I am nothing. I will never be anything. I cannot want to be anything. Apart from that, I have within me all the dreams of the world.\" And it was with this determination that the writer from Pernambuco dedicated the last 10 years to the poet's life and work. José Paulo Cavalcanti discovered Fernando Pessoa's work in 1966; the first poem he read was \"Tobacco Shop.\" \"It was the beginning of a passion that still enchants and oppresses me today,\" he confesses. \"I even have the feeling that I liked him even more at that time. Perhaps because all beginnings of passion are like that, they eventually cool; or perhaps, like the river in his village, he simply belonged to fewer people.\" According to the author, as he delved deeper into Pessoa's work, his concerns grew. Who was Fernando Pessoa the man, how he lived, with whom he related, who were the personas who came to life with him, to name just a few. One of the book's greatest revelations concerns precisely his heteronyms, which, according to José Paulo Cavalcanti, number 127 (and not 67, as previously believed). Immersed in the poet's life, Cavalcanti gained a better understanding of this restless man, his anxieties, and the scope of his work. In Lisbon, he spoke with people who knew him, touched papers written by him, visited the houses where he lived, and, standing at his desk in his bedroom, even imagined he saw him writing *The Herdsman*. \"In truth, what I did was write the biography of Fernando Pessoa that I would like to read,\" smiles José Paulo Cavalcanti, looking at the finished book, the fruit of eight years of work and five hours of writing a day, \"without missing a day.\" \"Since I began delving deeper into Pessoa's universe, I've been collecting questions I couldn't resolve. So I decided to do it myself. It turns out that Fernando Pessoa himself wrote practically the entire book. It really is an (almost) autobiography, as the title suggests,\" he jokes, referring to the hundreds of phrases and quotes from the poet, compiled and used in the text, always with quotation marks. \"The rest were testimonies from people who knew him and just a few contributions of my own.\" The lawyer from Pernambuco delved into every detail of the work to reveal the subject. \"Nobody imagines that they could run into someone on the street, by complete chance, who knew Fernando Pessoa. And I did,\" says the author. \"I read and researched, read and researched. Every time I came across a reference in a poem, I'd look it up to see if that place, or that person, actually existed. And it was a sure thing: they did. I ended up concluding that Fernando Pessoa was the most unimaginative writer I've ever encountered in my life. He lived everything he wrote; he didn't invent a thing!\" José Paulo followed every possible trace of Pessoa, a man whose life was methodical and confined to a few blocks in Lisbon—his home, his work, the cafés he frequented. Even so, the task of piecing together the details and finding the answers he sought led the author to make, on average, five trips a year to Portugal, where he hired the services of researchers, historians, consultants, and a journalist to verify the facts. Parallel to his research, José Paulo gathered documents and pieces from Pessoa's collection, acquired from relatives and even from a niece of Ofélia Queirós, the poet's great love. The result is a collection that will perhaps be the largest ever assembled about the poet outside of Portugal. Part of this collection will be on display in the exhibition \"Fernando Pessoa: Plural Like the Universe,\" whose opening coincides with the book's launch. Throughout the book, José Paulo Cavalcanti translates and explains for the Brazilian reader every Portuguese expression used, both in Pessoa's work and in testimonies and other records. \"Some people disagree, but I think it's essential for everyone to understand exactly what Fernando Pessoa meant, in the case of the poems, and also the precise meaning of the testimonies and records.\" Fernando Pessoa: An Almost Autobiography is the record of this lifelong encounter, from completely new, even personal, perspectives. If it's the book Cavalcanti would have liked to have read, it's also the book that Fernando Pessoa wrote throughout his life, without realizing it—and that José Paulo carefully collected over the years.","brand":"Totvsrj-record-dc","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47176804958460,"sku":"9788501090638","price":144.9,"currency_code":"BRL","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0722\/9197\/5420\/files\/a6d37d87c445f85335aed8563f06d623_84d97d4b-a7f5-41d5-be9d-57fd71c66fa5.jpg?v=1778317256"}],"url":"https:\/\/www.record.com.br\/en\/collections\/jose-paulo-cavalcanti.oembed","provider":"Editora Record","version":"1.0","type":"link"}