The Book of Disquiet

Q: Do I have to buy the ebook to participate in a book club?

No, you don’t have to buy the ebook to participate, but we do recommend it to get the most out of your club. There are several premium social reading features that are only available when you buy the ebook, like annotations, reactions, comment threads, resources, discussion prompts, and more, all embedded right in the text. It’s a unique and immersive way to read.

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It’s annoying, we know. App store rules prevent us from selling directly in the app, so for now you can only purchase ebooks on our website. Don’t worry: when you purchase an ebook on the web, it’s automatically added to your bookshelf in the app.

Q: How is Fable’s reader different from Kindle?

Kindle is a straightforward e-reader; Fable is an interactive e-reader that includes social features inside the ebooks. When you read an ebook on Fable, you can see and react to the text with others in real time. Start a discussion, share highlights and quotes, add emoji reactions—all of it lives right inside the book. It’s hard to explain and easy to see, so we recommend reading the free sample in one of our most active clubs to get a feel for it.

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Most of our clubs are completely free to join. The only exceptions are clubs marked as “Premium” or “Career Development,” which do require a fee. You can find out more on each club’s detail page.

Q: How do I start a book club with this book on Fable?

The first step is to download the Fable app. From there, you’ll be able to create your own private or public book club and invite others to read with you. Once your club is created, click on the plus sign under “Currently reading” and search for this book to add it to your club.

By Fernando Pessoa & William Boyd &

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Publisher Description

Sitting at his desk, Bernardo Soares imagined himself free forever of Rua dos Douradores, of his boss Vasques, of Moreira the book-keeper, of all the other employees, the errand boy, the post boy, even the cat. But if he left them all tomorrow and discarded the suit of clothes he wears, what else would he do? Because he would have to do something. And what suit would he wear? Because he would have to wear another suit.

A self-deprecating reflection on the sheer distance between the loftiness of his feelings and the humdrum reality of his life, The Book of Disquiet is a classic of existentialist literature.

332 Reviews

4.0

Lola

Created about 24 hours ago

Ananya

Created 19 days ago

Haniel

Created 20 days ago

“7/5 star read! There are three-star reads, four-stars, even five-star reads. But there’s something in this book that wrapped my soul—not just from the beginning, but before the beginning; rather, before time itself. I can’t even begin to put into words how I felt about this novel—or rather, this autobiography—not just of Fernando Pessoa’s life, but of my own, as if it were plagiarizing my very existence while I experienced it. This book held my heart in every way imaginable—I cried, smiled, laughed, and cried even more. This is a frightening autobiography that makes me wonder—did my future self write this to warn the present me?”

Sophia ☕️

Created 26 days ago

Vageesha

Created 27 days ago

“Pessoa has been my friend and guide over the past two years. My faith underwent a change after getting into his mind. If someone asks which work transformed me the most out of the many at a personal level, I might have to name this. There were times I related with The Book of Disquiet and felt at home, there were others when I just could not but saw the world through a different eye lens, and then there were others where I saw the dynamism of the world unfolding before me. Questions I never knew existed unfurled and answers to a few of them were arrived upon. It was in these paragraphs that I grew. There is just so much learning with Pessoa. A devotion of mine he is ♥️”

About Fernando Pessoa

Fernando Pessoa, one of the founders of modernism, was born in Lisbon in 1888. He grew up in Durban, South Africa, where his stepfather was Portuguese consul. He returned to Lisbon in 1905 and worked as a clerk in an import-export company until his death in 1935. Most of Pessoa's writing was not published during his lifetime; The Book of Disquiet first came out in Portugal in 1982. Since its first publication, it has been hailed as a classic.