'As Únicas Coisas Nobres Que a Vida Contém'

  • Osvaldo Manuel Silvestre Center for Portuguese Literature, University of Coimbra
DOI: https://doi.org/10.14195/1637

Abstract

In Livro do Desassossego (The Book of Disquiet) we can read that "To see and to listen are the only noble things that life comprehends. All other senses are plebeian and carnal." What happens if in our approach to Pessoa we read this affirmation straightforwardly, replacing the visible with the optic and the auditory with the acoustic? In other words, what if we read Pessoa´s subject not just as a body-without-organs constantly producing sensations, but instead as a non-body that requires media (and artifacts) as a prerequisite for its exteriorization?

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Author Biography

Osvaldo Manuel Silvestre, Center for Portuguese Literature, University of Coimbra

Osvaldo Manuel Silvestre teaches in the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures at the Faculty of Arts, University of Coimbra. He holds a Ph.D. in Literary Theory from the University of Coimbra. He has taught courses in the Modern Languages and Portuguese and Lusophone Studies BA Programs. He has also taught in the Art Studies Program (Aesthetics, Art and Multimedia, Introduction to New Media, Film Analysis). In collaboration with Luís Quintais, he has taught a course on «Anthropology and Literature» in the Department of Life Sciences at the University of Coimbra.  At post-graduate level he has taught courses on Literary Theory and on Spanish Language Literature («The Worlds of Borges»). He was coordinator of the Portuguese and Lusophone Studies Program between 2006 and 2009. He has published articles and books on theory, aesthetics, Portuguese language literatures, comparative literature, contemporary art, and cultural criticism. He is a member of the Centre for Portuguese Literature at the University of Coimbra.

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MatLit_1.1 (2013)
Published
2013-06-30
How to Cite
SILVESTRE, Osvaldo Manuel. 'As Únicas Coisas Nobres Que a Vida Contém'. MATLIT: Materialities of Literature, [S.l.], v. 1, n. 1, p. 89-112, june 2013. ISSN 2182-8830. Available at: <https://impactum-journals.uc.pt/matlit/article/view/1637>. Date accessed: 14 apr. 2019. doi: https://doi.org/10.14195/1637.
Citation Formats
Issue
Vol 1 No 1 (2013): Estranging Pessoa with the Materialities of Literature
Section
Secção Temática | Thematic Section

Keywords

Sense Organs; Phenomenology of Perception; Media; Devices

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