STAND 20

In-8.º   1st Edition. Original paper cover not binding. This work is the most known book from the famous Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa, composed of 44 poems. The poet called Mensagem (Message) a 'small book of poems.' At the time the book received a public award by the Secretariat of National Propaganda, headed by Antonio Ferro. It tells of the glorious past of Portugal and tries to make sense of the old “grandeur” very much valued at the time the book was written. Above all glorifies Camões and the symbolic value of past heroes, such as the Portuguese Discoverers. Fernando Pessoa believed the country would be 'regenerated', becoming great as in the past through cultural appreciation of the nation. The most famous poem of the book is Mar Português (Portuguese Sea). Pessoa published relatively little, and almost nothing in book form, so that his work only began to become well known in the 1940s, when the first large-scale edition of his works was issued.