Only half a century after his death did Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) become famous in the Western world, due to his collected notes in prose published in ‚The Book of Disquiet‘. This publication was a bestseller, and in its wake also aroused interest for Pessoa’s poetry. His poetics regarding heteronyms was, however, not always well understood, despite of the fact that he had clearly defined the difference between pseudonyms and heteronyms (the latter term refers to the invention of fictitious writers and their works by the author). Today excellent descriptions of Pessoa’s multiple poetry have been published, especially in the German language. However, the theoretical considerations of the young poet that induced him to make use of this technique are less widely known. The following article intends to answer the questions why Pessoa felt so strongly inhibited at the outset of creating his own poetry and why he experienced the invention of the heteronyms as a liberating act.