The Unveiling of Fernando Pessoa’s Literary Legacy: The Duke of Parma

ongoing

This proposal aims to study the genesis of the unpublished drama The Duke of Parma, a Shakespearean-inspired five-act play written in 16th-century English by one of the most renowned authors of the XX century: Fernando Pessoa (1888-1935). By interpreting the creative process behind the composition of the drama, THEDUKE will challenge the established idea of a literary text as a static product and will bring to the public’s attention the last hidden gem in Fernando Pessoa’s archive. Using palaeographic techniques, together with the help of an AI-powered tool for Handwritten Text Recognition (HTR), a material analysis of the manuscripts will be performed to determine their textual context and identify the textual variants. A further investigation of the author's archive and private library will be conducted to analyze the influences of external literary sources on the drama's genesis. To reach its objectives, THEDUKE requires an interdisciplinary approach and draws on the collective knowledge of Portuguese Literature, English Literature, History of Theatre, and Textual Criticism. The results of THEDUKE will be hosted on an open digital database, which will display images of the manuscripts, provide transcriptions, and offer insight into the compositional process. This project will hold substantial implications for Lusophone Literature, Modernist Literature, and the History of Theatre since it will shed light on a fundamental piece of Pessoa’s dramatic piece, and it will generate new critical perspectives in the realm of European literature. At UNIPR, I will collaborate with experts in Renaissance English Literature and Digital Humanities to combine my specialized knowledge of the genesis of Pessoa's work with theirs to ensure the project's success. My prior research experience, along with the new competencies I will acquire will allow me to become a recognized specialist in Pessoa's work and bolster my position as an expert researcher in Portuguese Literature and Text