Fernando Pessoa’s Book of Disquiet Tarot

Fernando Pessoa’s Book of Disquiet Major Arcana Tarot is a 22 card deck.

On these cards you will find passages from The Book of Disquiet by the Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa, translated from Portuguese by Margaret Jull Costa, edited by Jerónimo Pizarro, published by New Directions Publishing, with passages chosen by Jeff Carreira.

The Book of Disquiet is an existential masterpiece written by the modernist poet Fernando Pessoa during the first half of the 20th Century. The book is a fictional memoir and a sustained inquiry into the experience of living. Mundane activities like the daily tasks of a booking clerk, meals eaten in local restaurants, and walks through the rainy streets of Lisbon, are all illuminated with a penetrating gaze. Through it all, the central character, a stand in for Pessoa himself, dreams of wondrous places and impossible possibilities. The book reveals the meaningfulness that always exists in the most ordinary moments and champions the powerful way that monotony can sometimes thrust us into spiritual revelation. This book has had a powerful effect on my consciousness and my life. It taught me what real art is and how it can be used to reveal the sacredness that lies behind the surface of everything. It has been a pleasure to choose the phrases that you will find on these cards and an even greater pleasure to think that they might introduce you to a truly remarkable piece of writing.

The passages you find on these cards contain the wisdom of a deeply sensitive soul who walked the Earth but lived in dreams, and never ceased wondering about the meaning of life.

Use these cards as a tool for finding the extraordinary in the ordinary.

1. When you are feeling overwhelmed by the meaninglessness of life and need an inroad to the sacred, choose and read a card.
2. If you want to develop your own inner sight choose a card everyday for thirty days and use it as a lens to look through for the rest of the day.