The Size of My View

It has been suggested to me several times that I start a blog, but I always hesitated, fearing I would not be able to maintain it. But now I have decided to take the plunge and, as you can see, I am up and running. For now, I will be making posts once a week on Sunday, with the goal of four posts a month. When people suggested that I start a blog, they always suggested that I talk about books since that was my specialty, but I will not limit myself to books. Other topics will include anime and manga, movies, the occasional current affairs piece (I don’t tend to look at the news much and would not want to write on a subject that I felt I did not at least have a basic understanding of), and maybe some of my own creative writing.

The name of my blog was inspired by a poem by the Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa in the guise of his “heteronym” Alberto Caerio (you can Google this for a full explanation). The poem, quoted below, is section VII from “The Keeper of Sheep,” translated by Richard Zenith:

“From my village I see as much of the universe as can be seen

from the earth,

And so my village is as large as any town,

For I am the size of what I see

And not the size of my height…

In the cities life is smaller

Than here in my house on top of this hill.

The big buildings of cities lock up the view,

They hide the horizon, pulling our gaze far away from the

open sky.

They make us small, for they take away all the vastness our

eyes can see,

And they make us poor, for our only wealth is seeing.“

P.S. by all means, please feel free to leave comments and feedback, I welcome them.

Patrick Paul Barrett