Masks

There is a kind of failure that consists not in falling short, but in having arrived in costume. It begins with a small lapse, almost a courtesy: someone takes us for who we are not, and we let it stand, because correcting them would be awkward and because, for a moment, it is flattering.

Álvaro de Campos — one of Pessoa's heteronyms — tells it better.

Fiz de mim o que não soube, E o que podia fazer de mim não o fiz. O dominó que vesti era errado. Conheceram-me logo por quem não era e não desmenti, e perdi-me. Quando quis tirar a máscara, Estava pegada à cara. Quando a tirei e me vi ao espelho, Já tinha envelhecido. Estava bêbado, já não sabia vestir o dominó que não tinha tirado. Deitei fora a máscara e dormi no vestiário Como um cão tolerado pela gerência Por ser inofensivo E vou escrever esta história para provar que sou sublime.

Fernando Pessoa (Álvaro de Campos), Tabacaria

In English, roughly: I made of myself what I did not know how to make, and what I could have made of myself I did not. The domino I wore was the wrong one. They took me at once for someone I was not, and I did not deny it, and I lost myself. When I tried to take off the mask, it was stuck to my face. When I took it off and saw myself in the mirror, I had already grown old. I was drunk, and no longer knew how to wear the domino I had not taken off. I threw the mask away and slept in the cloakroom, like a dog tolerated by the management for being harmless. And I am going to write this story to prove that I am sublime.

The last line is the best thing in the passage, and it is what stops the whole thing from reading as a complaint. After the stuck mask, the mirror, the ageing and the cloakroom, one more mask arrives: I will write the story of my failure to prove that I am sublime.

There is no clean way out. The confession is a costume too.