Message ("Mensagem") was the only book of verse in his own language that Pessoa saw through the press in his lifetime. On the face of it, a patriotic sequence steeped in 'Sebastianismo', the poems offer much more than this, the Kings and navigators of the Portugal's history standing as avatars of the poet's self, their explorations and heroic deeds projections of the poet's inner creative life. Although Pessoa is famous for the many heteronyms under which he composed verse in wildly different styles, this volume was published under his own name (the 'orthonym', as he defined it) and it remains one of his great masterpieces. This edition brings Jonathan Griffin's fine translation, originally published by the Menard Press in 1992, back into print, as part of Shearsman's Pessoa edition.
