Wanderlino Arruda

As Bess Sondel so eloquently states, Words can evoke every emotion
possible: shock, joy, terror, happiness, nostalgia, peace... Words have
such terrifying power, they can drag one down to apathy or shoot you up
to delirium, they can exalt to extreme moral and esthetic experiences.
This is the most absolute truth. I don't think there is a living soul
anywhere that doubts it. Words have a force, a resistance, a power that
supplants almost everything else that exists in the world. Armies,
Dynasties, Republics... these all pass, but words, words are never
lost. They are eternal, firmer than the granite of ancient monuments
and palaces. The words of Socrates, tran scripted by Plato, supplanted
all Greek government with its military and civil works. The majestic
pyramids and sphinx of Egypt will one day turn to dust, but the words
inscribed in the Book of the Dead will never disappear.

It is probably because of this, that we have at our disposition, in the
Portuguese language, a word that, in the entire world, has no equal in
sense, meaning and semantic force, as much power in the denotative
sense (if this is possible) as well as the connotative sense, as the
word saudade, its origin as murky and obscure as the depths of the
Portuguese oceans, as dark, deep and mysterious as the virginity of the
Amazon jungle, or as scalding as African Angola and Mozambique, also
speakers of the Lusitanian language.

So, then... Let me ask you. Where exactly does the word saudade come
from? From the Latin solitate, meaning solitude, loneliness? Or from
the Arabian saudah? Perhaps the ancient Spanish soydade, suydade? Even
Antenor Nascentes, who was our leading expert in etymology, doesn't
quite convince us in his explanation of the word's beginning. Could
it have been derived from the Portuguese word saúde, which means
health, because it looks like a phonetic analogy? I really doubt it.

So, not being possible, at the present time, to define where this
strange and magnetic word came from, we at least have the satisfaction
and honor of having it securely within the domain of our Portuguese
vocabulary. This, we can do without fear of interference from any
language found in or out of the Latin family of languages. The French
word solitude, exactly the same as in English, is far from expressing
the feeling that saudade represents to us. The Esperanto words,
(re)sopiro and rememoro are also just as far from defining what we mean
when we use the word saudade. They are miles away from expressing the
semantic treasure we tap when we use it.

And, by the way, just what is saudade? It's an emotion that should
dwell within the heart of all humanity, of all races, rich or poor, and
in every country of the world. Saudade doesn't choose, it doesn't
discriminate, it doesn't have to beg for permission to present
itself. It can come as softly as a breeze or as terrifying as a
thunderbolt out of the blue, arriving when we least expect. Saudade is
solitude's best friend, close companion, inseparable lover, invisible
visit of friendship, sometimes smoldering coals of passion, and in many
cases, a suave perfume, shared moments of tenderness.

To tell the truth, it's not easy to define the feeling-meaning of
saudade. And, it may be for this alone, that it exists only as an icon
of the mystic Portuguese language. Saudade is even more exalted in the
Brazilian dialect, this marvelous mixture of three great primordial
races. White European, Black African and Tupi Amerindian. Saudade is a
pain that suffocates the heart and gratifies the soul. Saudade is the
presence of the absent, the memory of the loved one, a sort of
bittersweet, give and take arrangement of convenience with distance, a
joyful, pleasant sorrow of the seen-unseen, of love, in the absence of
the beloved.

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