SOURCE: "Fernando Pessoa's Legacy: The Presença and After," in World Literature Today, Vol. 53, No. 1, Winter, 1979, pp. 5-9.

Severino examines the effect of the Presença movement in Portugal on Pessoa's enduring reputation, and his contribution to the nationalistic movement.

To study the extent and character of Fernando Pessoa's legacy, it is necessary to consider the circumstances surrounding the publication of his work. Practically unknown at the time of his death, Pessoa (1888-1935) possessed a reputation based solely on Mensagem (Message; 1934), a book of nationalistic verse imbedded in the occult—a little-known facet of this multifaceted poet—as well as on several dozen poems scattered throughout short-lived, inaccessible journals such as Orpheu (1915), Athena (1924-25), Contemporânea (1922-26) and Presença (1927-40).

Nor did Pessoa's known work give the true measure of his legacy. Mensagem was not well received, not even by some of the poet's small band of...