Fernando Pessoa, Cesário Verde. Suas cidades

Abstract

It is not unknown the cult of the city in Cesário Verde and in the modernist Fernando Pessoa. "Num bairro moderno”, Cesário Verde, by painting the "transparency" that tints not only the houses, the nature around him, but also the people, has a sudden insight, “que visão de artista! / Se eu transformasse os simples vegetais (...)/ Num ser humano que se mova e exista...”. Pessoa-Caeiro in "O guardador de rebanhos" seems to become depressed in the city: “Na cidade [em que] as grandes casas fecham a vista à chave, / Escondem o horizonte, empurram o nosso olhar para longe de todo o céu, / Tornam-nos pequenos porque nos tiram o que os nossos olhos nos podem dar, / E tornam-nos pobres porque a nossa única riqueza é ver.” The atmosphere that Verde shows in his poem is, under his eyes, of discoveries that change the lyrical self. Would the city be also a place of discoveries for Alberto Caeiro or would it be a place where our eyes are pushed away “para longe de todo o céu”? I intend, with these two poems, to study the look of Cesário and Pessoa-Caeiro over the city.