Clepsydra

Pessanha, Camilo Almeida, 1867-1926Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.8

Word count: 16K words
Chapters: 2

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Clepsydra by Camilo Almeida PessanhaAuthor: Pessanha, Camilo Almeida, 1867-1926,Language: Portuguese, Class: PQ: Language and Literatures: Romance literatures: French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Release Date: Aug 16, 2007

Editor's review

Clepsydra is a poetry collection by the Portuguese poet Camilo Almeida Pessanha and occupies a distinctive place in Portuguese Symbolist literature. Pessanha's poetic output is small, yet he is known for extremely refined language and deep feeling, skilled at presenting a gaze upon time, disappearance, and existence itself within a slow, suspended rhythm. The title "Water Clock" itself suggests the image of time passing and echoes themes such as dusk, ruins, and weariness that recur throughout the collection. Reading this work, one can sense an almost musical Portuguese cadence; the lines are short and highly dense, suited to repeated recitation. For readers studying Portuguese literature, Symbolism, or modern poetry of the Iberian Peninsula, this is an indispensable primary text. As a public-domain ebook with the main text in Portuguese, it is recommended that readers have some Portuguese reading ability or use a parallel translation for support in order to appreciate its linguistic subtleties.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Literature students and researchers studying Portuguese Symbolist poetry
Readers interested in the origins of modern poetry on the Iberian Peninsula
Language learners with a foundation in Portuguese who wish to read the original poems closely
Poetry lovers who collect public-domain literary ebooks

Not a good fit for

General readers with no Portuguese at all and no parallel translation
Those expecting plot-driven narrative or prose-like reading experience
Beginners who need extensive annotations and introductions to enter a poetic text

Reading tips

First read through once to feel the rhythm and imagery, then read poem by poem with a Portuguese dictionary to study key words.
Read alongside background material on Portuguese Symbolism to understand its echoes of contemporaneous European poetry.
Reading the lines aloud is recommended to appreciate the sound and pauses in Pessanha's short lines.
Read only a small number of poems at a time, leaving time to savor them repeatedly; do not read through quickly.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book a Chinese translation?

No. This ebook is the original Portuguese text, a public-domain text from Project Gutenberg, with the main text in Portuguese. Chinese readers who wish to read it are advised to look for a parallel translation or to gain some foundation in Portuguese before approaching the original.

Is Pessanha's poetry suitable for beginning readers?

Pessanha's poems have refined language, dense imagery, and a rather slow rhythm, and they make some demands on the reader's experience with poetry. If you have never encountered Symbolist poetry, it is advisable first to read introductions and selected poems in Portuguese poetry anthologies before entering this collection.

Why is the book titled Clepsydra?

Clepsydra means "water clock," an ancient device that measured time by the flow of water. The title echoes the sense of time passing, disappearance, and suspension that recurs throughout the collection; as you read, watch for images related to water, dusk, and ruins.

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About the author

Pessanha, Camilo Almeida, 1867-1926 Author · Portuguese · 1867–1926

Camilo Almeida Pessanha (1867–1926) was a Portuguese Symbolist poet who, though born in Portugal, spent a long period living in Macau, and his life and work were closely bound up with that Far Eastern port city. He published little during his lifetime; only one work is held in this collection, his representative volume Clepsydra. The collection uses a concise, musical language to explore the passage of time and the sense of memory and loss, reflecting the Symbolist emphasis on suggestion and atmosphere. Pessanha's poetry is quiet and restrained, with delicate imagery, and it occupies a distinctive place in Portuguese literature's transition from the nineteenth century to modernity, exerting an influence on later Portuguese poets. Because public information is limited, the details of his life are difficult to set out fully, and scholars and readers know his artistic achievement chiefly through Clepsydra.