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The Hour of the Star
The Hour of the Star, Clarice Lispector's consummate final novel, may well be her masterpiece. Narrated by the cosmopolitan Rodrigo S.M., this brief, strange, and haunting tale is the story of Macabéa, one of life's unfortunates. Living in the slums of Rio de Janeiro and eking out a poor living as a typist, Macabéa loves movies, Coca-Cola, and her rat of a boyfriend; she would like to be like Marilyn Monroe, but she is ugly, underfed, sickly, and unloved. Rodrigo recoils from her wretchedness, and yet he cannot avoid realization that for all her outward misery, Macabéa is inwardly free. She doesn't seem to know how unhappy she should be. Lispector employs her pathetic heroine against her urbane, empty narrator--edge of despair to edge of despair--and, working them like a pair of scissors, she cuts away the reader's preconceived notions about poverty, identity, love, and the art of fiction. In her last novel she takes readers close to the true mystery of life, and leaves us deep in Lispector territory indeed.
96 pages, Paperback
First published October 26, 1977
About the author
Clarice Lispector
210 books5,421 followersClarice Lispector was a Brazilian writer. Acclaimed internationally for her innovative novels and short stories, she was also a journalist. Born to a Jewish family in Podolia in Western Ukraine, she was brought to Brazil as an infant, amidst the disasters engulfing her native land following the First World War.
She grew up in northeastern Brazil, where her mother died when she was nine. The family moved to Rio de Janeiro when she was in her teens. While in law school in Rio she began publishing her first journalistic work and short stories, catapulting to fame at age 23 with the publication of her first novel, 'Near to the Wild Heart' (Perto do Coração Selvagem), written as an interior monologue in a style and language that was considered revolutionary in Brazil.
She left Brazil in 1944, following her marriage to a Brazilian diplomat, and spent the next decade and a half in Europe and the United States. Upon return to Rio de Janeiro in 1959, she began producing her most famous works, including the stories of Family Ties (Laços de Família), the great mystic novel The Passion According to G.H. (A Paixão Segundo G.H.), and the novel many consider to be her masterpiece, Água Viva. Injured in an accident in 1966, she spent the last decade of her life in frequent pain, steadily writing and publishing novels and stories until her premature death in 1977.
She has been the subject of numerous books and references to her, and her works are common in Brazilian literature and music. Several of her works have been turned into films, one being 'Hour of the Star' and she was the subject of a recent biography, Why This World, by Benjamin Moser.
She grew up in northeastern Brazil, where her mother died when she was nine. The family moved to Rio de Janeiro when she was in her teens. While in law school in Rio she began publishing her first journalistic work and short stories, catapulting to fame at age 23 with the publication of her first novel, 'Near to the Wild Heart' (Perto do Coração Selvagem), written as an interior monologue in a style and language that was considered revolutionary in Brazil.
She left Brazil in 1944, following her marriage to a Brazilian diplomat, and spent the next decade and a half in Europe and the United States. Upon return to Rio de Janeiro in 1959, she began producing her most famous works, including the stories of Family Ties (Laços de Família), the great mystic novel The Passion According to G.H. (A Paixão Segundo G.H.), and the novel many consider to be her masterpiece, Água Viva. Injured in an accident in 1966, she spent the last decade of her life in frequent pain, steadily writing and publishing novels and stories until her premature death in 1977.
She has been the subject of numerous books and references to her, and her works are common in Brazilian literature and music. Several of her works have been turned into films, one being 'Hour of the Star' and she was the subject of a recent biography, Why This World, by Benjamin Moser.
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December 10, 2023
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” John 1:1
The personality of the narrator remains a mystery but his wish to mock Saint John the Evangelist is evident:
So the raconteur creates a gospel of the utter nonentity…
There is a girl but her life is an opposite of any living… And her existence is an antithesis of any divinity…
Some lives are like shooting stars – just a momentary flash and everything vanishes without a trace.
The personality of the narrator remains a mystery but his wish to mock Saint John the Evangelist is evident:
All the world began with a yes. One molecule said yes to another molecule and life was born. But before prehistory there was the prehistory of prehistory and there was the never and there was the yes. It was ever so. I don’t know why, but I do know that the universe never began.
So the raconteur creates a gospel of the utter nonentity…
She thought she’d incur serious punishment and even risk dying if she took too much pleasure in life. So she protected herself from death by living less, consuming so little of her life that she’d never run out. This savings gave her a little security since you can’t fall farther than the ground. Did she feel she was living for nothing? I’m not sure, but I don’t think so. Only once did she ask a tragic question: who am I? It frightened her so much that she completely stopped thinking.
There is a girl but her life is an opposite of any living… And her existence is an antithesis of any divinity…
— You know what else I learned? They said you should be glad to be alive. So I am. I also heard a pretty song, I even cried.
Some lives are like shooting stars – just a momentary flash and everything vanishes without a trace.
December 5, 2019
What a delightful surprise!
I didn’t know anything about Clarice Lispector when I picked up this slim novel, and started reading. She had me in her dedication already, starting with the (ir)reverent sentence:
"I dedicate this thing here to old Schumann and his sweet Clara who today alas are bones."
Nothing drags me into a story like such an opening. What can I expect? Irony, sarcasm, cultural reflections on music, a novel - or a “thing” of some other definition? Absolutely brilliant! One short sentence, a universe of questions. A light tone, indicating deeper thoughts. A sense of humour, and respect for cultural achievements and human connections...
I then make the acquaintance of one of the most eccentric narrators I have ever met, who claims to tell the story of a young woman, but is more concerned with himself and his ultimate reasons for writing. The process of telling the story is immediately the main focus:
“Make no mistake, I only achieve simplicity with enormous effort.”
For the reader however, the simplicity is not necessarily evident. On the contrary, the narrator moves around, slowly, in circles, offering bits and pieces:
“The story, I determine - with false free will - will have around seven characters and I am obviously one of the more important.”
In contradiction to his self-proclaimed importance, he also announces that his main task is to describe a young girl in a simple manner:
“I humbly limit myself - without trumpeting my humility for then it wouldn’t be humble - I limit myself to telling of the lame adventures of a girl in a city that’s entirely against her.”
This, of course, makes me laugh out loud at its brilliant silliness, and the narrator catapults himself into the realm of Uriah Heep, making the very ‘umble servant of David Copperfield look like a dilettante.
The narrator is physically engaged in the act of writing, it makes him suffer and feel frustration, especially since his main character is so annoying. This brings to mind other stories where characters and narrators struggle with each other, most notably Martin Amis’ London Fields, where it is the other way around: one of the characters being frustrated with the narrator’s lack of drive. Muriel Spark staged a determined female main character, who forced the narrator to tag along with her while taking The Driver's Seat herself. It also recalls Pirandello’s wonderful play Sei personaggi in cerca d'autore, where the connection between narrator and characters has yet to be established in a kind of job interview.
As a reflection on storytelling and the intricate net of relationships between authors, narrators, characters and readers, this is an outstanding masterpiece. I could quote every single page. It is also an impressive account of the different layers of human identity, and of how we establish what we are and why. It goes to the root of the monstrosity of the human condition, asking if we are normal, or misfits:
“Who has not asked himself at some time or other: am I a monster or is this what it means to be a person?”
And it clarifies the needs of the creative, thinking person, picking up Virginia Woolf’s idea from A Room of One's Own:
“She had a room all to herself. She could hardly believe that all this space was hers. And not a word was heard. So she danced in an act of absolute courage, since her aunt couldn’t hear her. She danced and twirled because being alone made her: f-r-e-e!”
It explores the question of truth, belief and reality. Sometimes lies are more decent and well-mannered than truth. Sometimes things exist only because we believe in them, and sometimes we ask forgiveness of beings we know do not exist, and we are forgiven!
As a plot, this book is made of nothing. But that hardly matters at all. It is full of life!
I didn’t know anything about Clarice Lispector when I picked up this slim novel, and started reading. She had me in her dedication already, starting with the (ir)reverent sentence:
"I dedicate this thing here to old Schumann and his sweet Clara who today alas are bones."
Nothing drags me into a story like such an opening. What can I expect? Irony, sarcasm, cultural reflections on music, a novel - or a “thing” of some other definition? Absolutely brilliant! One short sentence, a universe of questions. A light tone, indicating deeper thoughts. A sense of humour, and respect for cultural achievements and human connections...
I then make the acquaintance of one of the most eccentric narrators I have ever met, who claims to tell the story of a young woman, but is more concerned with himself and his ultimate reasons for writing. The process of telling the story is immediately the main focus:
“Make no mistake, I only achieve simplicity with enormous effort.”
For the reader however, the simplicity is not necessarily evident. On the contrary, the narrator moves around, slowly, in circles, offering bits and pieces:
“The story, I determine - with false free will - will have around seven characters and I am obviously one of the more important.”
In contradiction to his self-proclaimed importance, he also announces that his main task is to describe a young girl in a simple manner:
“I humbly limit myself - without trumpeting my humility for then it wouldn’t be humble - I limit myself to telling of the lame adventures of a girl in a city that’s entirely against her.”
This, of course, makes me laugh out loud at its brilliant silliness, and the narrator catapults himself into the realm of Uriah Heep, making the very ‘umble servant of David Copperfield look like a dilettante.
The narrator is physically engaged in the act of writing, it makes him suffer and feel frustration, especially since his main character is so annoying. This brings to mind other stories where characters and narrators struggle with each other, most notably Martin Amis’ London Fields, where it is the other way around: one of the characters being frustrated with the narrator’s lack of drive. Muriel Spark staged a determined female main character, who forced the narrator to tag along with her while taking The Driver's Seat herself. It also recalls Pirandello’s wonderful play Sei personaggi in cerca d'autore, where the connection between narrator and characters has yet to be established in a kind of job interview.
As a reflection on storytelling and the intricate net of relationships between authors, narrators, characters and readers, this is an outstanding masterpiece. I could quote every single page. It is also an impressive account of the different layers of human identity, and of how we establish what we are and why. It goes to the root of the monstrosity of the human condition, asking if we are normal, or misfits:
“Who has not asked himself at some time or other: am I a monster or is this what it means to be a person?”
And it clarifies the needs of the creative, thinking person, picking up Virginia Woolf’s idea from A Room of One's Own:
“She had a room all to herself. She could hardly believe that all this space was hers. And not a word was heard. So she danced in an act of absolute courage, since her aunt couldn’t hear her. She danced and twirled because being alone made her: f-r-e-e!”
It explores the question of truth, belief and reality. Sometimes lies are more decent and well-mannered than truth. Sometimes things exist only because we believe in them, and sometimes we ask forgiveness of beings we know do not exist, and we are forgiven!
As a plot, this book is made of nothing. But that hardly matters at all. It is full of life!
June 23, 2024
As long as I have questions and no answers I’ll keep on writing.
Books, what are they for? Why do we read them? For Kafka, books were “the axe for the frozen sea within us”; Carl Sagan held them as “proof that humans are capable of working magic”. We say that particular arrangement and assortment of words create a world whose roots are hidden in the imagination of the author. Fiction per se, though is about things which may not exist in real world however it is very much about writing truth- to understand that truth is not in what happens but in what it tells us about who we are. In a sense, as Neil Gaiman says fiction is lie which tells truth.
And what about the responsibility of an author? Should he state things as they are, if that the case then we would have not been reading so many ‘great’ authors. However, isn’t it so that essentially everyone is writing the same thing, as Borges used to maintain. Why people keep on writing then and more importantly why we are reading them, individually and separately. George Orwell wrote that ‘one would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand’. An author may have an obligation, which is to not to freeze language, or to pretend it is a dead thing that must be revered, but to use it as a living thing, that flows, that borrows words, that allows meanings and pronunciations to change with time. Perhaps, that’s how the different art movements have graduated over the years and probably that’s why we have seen plethora of 'great' authors, and we still witnessing it, and perhaps would be seeing it in future too. And probably that’s how we have been privileged to come across authors such as Laszlo Krasznahorkai who write page long sentences but still they are so beautiful and pleasant to the readers’ eyes or Jose Saramago who bended the rule of punctuation and narrative shift, as I'm witnessing his abilities in Blindness, or Samuel Beckett who, I feel, was so talented that he outdone himself especially in How it is which follows only one rule that there are no rules.
There have been authors in the history of the literature, who have bent every rule of the literature, language and the raw charm associated with it keeps us on toes and every time we find such authors, the childish satisfaction we get amazes us. Clarice Lispector could be easily placed at the top of the list having authors who changed the writing, the way it is being written. She was once labeled as the most non-literary author to step into literary realm. However, she was self-taught who had primitive powers like a painter has and artful knowledge about tone of the narrative, language, dialogue which shows that she was in fact deeply literary. She wrote the way no one has written before, somewhat like Borges did- truly original and astoundingly fresh. She was deeply mystified by the world and uncomfortable with the life itself, as indeed with narrative, we observe it in Hour of the Star too.
Though The Hour of the Star published shortly before her death, but she was really at the top of her prowess right through the end of her wherein we see with bewilderment that her literary gifts and idiosyncrasies merged and folded in a densely self-conscious, self-reflective narrative, which like the prose of Blanchot handles the odd pleasures of storytelling. As the narrative moves forward, in the process the story of Macabéa unfolds (but that was never the main motive), she is a woman so unfortunate that as Lispector told an interviewer, "was so poor that all she ate were hot dogs". Lispector, however, made it clear that this was "not the story, though. The story is about a crushed innocence, about an anonymous misery." The story is unusual, to say the least, in its very nature, starts with an exploding declaration about search for identity for narrator as well for the author. It reminds me of Maurice Blanchot since the story is about negating the narrative itself to reveal true existence of it, truly self- reflective, as Blanchot used to do with his narratives.
For at the hour of death a person becomes a shining movie star, it’s everyone’s moment of glory and it’s when as it choral chanting you hear the whooshing shrieks.
The book follows tale of a woman from the state of Alagoas in the north-east of Brazil – the Lispectors first lived there when they came to the country – who then goes to live in Rio de Janeiro, as Clarice did. We read this intriguing fable through the observant eyes of Rodrigo S.M., the narrator of the story. The narrator uses his powerful position in delivering the plot, including a form of intrusive narration in which the narrator speaks directly to the reader. It is perhaps most striking feature about this book, other than its unique protagonist, its intriguing metafictional structure, wherein you, the readers, are active participants, as forced by the narrator though subtly. It is a multi-faceted narrative which not only concerns itself with the life of the protagonist, but also the life of her creator, her god, her author. It would be naïve to say that story is autobiographical; rather it is an exploration of self that is sometimes glimpsed, but barely known.
That girl didn’t know she was what she was, just as a dog doesn’t know it’s a dog. So she didn’t feel unhappy. The only thing she wanted was to live. She didn’t know for what, she didn’t ask questions. Maybe she thought there was a little bitty glory in living. She thought people had to be happy. So she was. Before her birth was she an idea? Before her birth was she dead? And after her birth she would die? What a thin slice of watermelon.
The book is written with unparalleled precision in which each sentence seems to be condensed with meditation of a pure artist as those sentences constitute the consternation and disquietness of the narrator as well as they stand alone for aphorisms. It is like a treatise about universe which is self-initiated and self-regulatory, omnipresent and ever soliciting authenticity of your existence. The narrative is ever alive which has an existence of its own and uses both protagonist and the reader to convey itself. But it’s not just narrative, it’s about all primitive life that breathes, breathes. The narrator too is self-created. He is capable of awkward asides, over-confidence in his own method, pure fear in the face of the power and powerlessness of the worlds, and then sudden passages of soaring beauty and stark definition.
Just as I’m writing at the very same time I’m being read.
We find that the unreliable narrator is not strong enough to mend the fate of the protagonist, he could not do anything to help her. His voice moves form the darkest wondering about existence of God to almost comic wandering around in his character; he is watching her, listening to her and then standing back. But there are times when the narrator forgets himself, as Beckett often does, and finds something too interesting or too grotesquely funny to be bothered about questioning its role in the narrative, its truth or its fictiveness. Perhaps, he is also identifying himself and realizing his true existence through his protagonist.
Forgive me but I’m going to keep talking about me who am unknown to myself, and as I write I’m a bit surprised because I discover I have a destiny. Who hasn’t ever wondered: amd I a monster or this is what it means to be a person?
Throughout the story we are being on our toes, as we have been pulled into narrative, time and again, by the omnipotent, strange narrator but only to realize that we are still readers and could not really intrude into the narrative. The narrative moves from a deep awareness about the tragedy of being alive to a sly allowance for the fact that existence is a comedy, which me reminds of Kafka as he used to put his characters in seemingly contradictory absurd situations wherein every probable move by them put out misery and comedy of their existence. The protagonist of the story sees her annihilation as some sort of unfulfilled existence which lingers somewhere between life and death wherein the soul could not be freed from existential curse even after death.
I’ll myself so bad when I die
The Hour of the Star is a great work of endless interrogation wherein the author, the narrator, the protagonist and the reader (i.e. you) are interrogated by ever changing and unreliable narrative that bangs along and promises no tidy conclusion. While the narrator in The Hour of the Star reveals to the audience his wish to ensure the novel's simplicity (in terms of writing) and stray from philosophical tangents, in reality the story is marked by complicated existentialist notions of identity. The author often reflects on his conscious effort to do so. As the novel unfolds, it becomes apparent that this quest for identity is as much about Macabéa's search for self as it is the narrator's own. Notions of being, who we are and who we aren't, and the struggle to finding meaning are all touched upon. In fact, the book looks to be incomplete to an un-initiated eye since it leaves so many questions unanswered. But this is exactly how it has been written- to question, the very existence of everything, even that of the narrative or text itself which is being written about it; the book (and its narrative) is truly existential in nature.
Like every writer, I am clearly tempted to use succulent terms: I have at my command magnificent adjectives, robust nouns, and verbs so agile that they glide through the atmosphere as they move into action. For surely words are actions? Yet I have no intention of adorning the word, for were I to touch the girl's bread, that bread would turn to gold—and the girl … would be unable to bite into it, and consequently die of hunger.
Books, what are they for? Why do we read them? For Kafka, books were “the axe for the frozen sea within us”; Carl Sagan held them as “proof that humans are capable of working magic”. We say that particular arrangement and assortment of words create a world whose roots are hidden in the imagination of the author. Fiction per se, though is about things which may not exist in real world however it is very much about writing truth- to understand that truth is not in what happens but in what it tells us about who we are. In a sense, as Neil Gaiman says fiction is lie which tells truth.
And what about the responsibility of an author? Should he state things as they are, if that the case then we would have not been reading so many ‘great’ authors. However, isn’t it so that essentially everyone is writing the same thing, as Borges used to maintain. Why people keep on writing then and more importantly why we are reading them, individually and separately. George Orwell wrote that ‘one would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand’. An author may have an obligation, which is to not to freeze language, or to pretend it is a dead thing that must be revered, but to use it as a living thing, that flows, that borrows words, that allows meanings and pronunciations to change with time. Perhaps, that’s how the different art movements have graduated over the years and probably that’s why we have seen plethora of 'great' authors, and we still witnessing it, and perhaps would be seeing it in future too. And probably that’s how we have been privileged to come across authors such as Laszlo Krasznahorkai who write page long sentences but still they are so beautiful and pleasant to the readers’ eyes or Jose Saramago who bended the rule of punctuation and narrative shift, as I'm witnessing his abilities in Blindness, or Samuel Beckett who, I feel, was so talented that he outdone himself especially in How it is which follows only one rule that there are no rules.
There have been authors in the history of the literature, who have bent every rule of the literature, language and the raw charm associated with it keeps us on toes and every time we find such authors, the childish satisfaction we get amazes us. Clarice Lispector could be easily placed at the top of the list having authors who changed the writing, the way it is being written. She was once labeled as the most non-literary author to step into literary realm. However, she was self-taught who had primitive powers like a painter has and artful knowledge about tone of the narrative, language, dialogue which shows that she was in fact deeply literary. She wrote the way no one has written before, somewhat like Borges did- truly original and astoundingly fresh. She was deeply mystified by the world and uncomfortable with the life itself, as indeed with narrative, we observe it in Hour of the Star too.
Though The Hour of the Star published shortly before her death, but she was really at the top of her prowess right through the end of her wherein we see with bewilderment that her literary gifts and idiosyncrasies merged and folded in a densely self-conscious, self-reflective narrative, which like the prose of Blanchot handles the odd pleasures of storytelling. As the narrative moves forward, in the process the story of Macabéa unfolds (but that was never the main motive), she is a woman so unfortunate that as Lispector told an interviewer, "was so poor that all she ate were hot dogs". Lispector, however, made it clear that this was "not the story, though. The story is about a crushed innocence, about an anonymous misery." The story is unusual, to say the least, in its very nature, starts with an exploding declaration about search for identity for narrator as well for the author. It reminds me of Maurice Blanchot since the story is about negating the narrative itself to reveal true existence of it, truly self- reflective, as Blanchot used to do with his narratives.
For at the hour of death a person becomes a shining movie star, it’s everyone’s moment of glory and it’s when as it choral chanting you hear the whooshing shrieks.
The book follows tale of a woman from the state of Alagoas in the north-east of Brazil – the Lispectors first lived there when they came to the country – who then goes to live in Rio de Janeiro, as Clarice did. We read this intriguing fable through the observant eyes of Rodrigo S.M., the narrator of the story. The narrator uses his powerful position in delivering the plot, including a form of intrusive narration in which the narrator speaks directly to the reader. It is perhaps most striking feature about this book, other than its unique protagonist, its intriguing metafictional structure, wherein you, the readers, are active participants, as forced by the narrator though subtly. It is a multi-faceted narrative which not only concerns itself with the life of the protagonist, but also the life of her creator, her god, her author. It would be naïve to say that story is autobiographical; rather it is an exploration of self that is sometimes glimpsed, but barely known.
That girl didn’t know she was what she was, just as a dog doesn’t know it’s a dog. So she didn’t feel unhappy. The only thing she wanted was to live. She didn’t know for what, she didn’t ask questions. Maybe she thought there was a little bitty glory in living. She thought people had to be happy. So she was. Before her birth was she an idea? Before her birth was she dead? And after her birth she would die? What a thin slice of watermelon.
The book is written with unparalleled precision in which each sentence seems to be condensed with meditation of a pure artist as those sentences constitute the consternation and disquietness of the narrator as well as they stand alone for aphorisms. It is like a treatise about universe which is self-initiated and self-regulatory, omnipresent and ever soliciting authenticity of your existence. The narrative is ever alive which has an existence of its own and uses both protagonist and the reader to convey itself. But it’s not just narrative, it’s about all primitive life that breathes, breathes. The narrator too is self-created. He is capable of awkward asides, over-confidence in his own method, pure fear in the face of the power and powerlessness of the worlds, and then sudden passages of soaring beauty and stark definition.
Just as I’m writing at the very same time I’m being read.
We find that the unreliable narrator is not strong enough to mend the fate of the protagonist, he could not do anything to help her. His voice moves form the darkest wondering about existence of God to almost comic wandering around in his character; he is watching her, listening to her and then standing back. But there are times when the narrator forgets himself, as Beckett often does, and finds something too interesting or too grotesquely funny to be bothered about questioning its role in the narrative, its truth or its fictiveness. Perhaps, he is also identifying himself and realizing his true existence through his protagonist.
Forgive me but I’m going to keep talking about me who am unknown to myself, and as I write I’m a bit surprised because I discover I have a destiny. Who hasn’t ever wondered: amd I a monster or this is what it means to be a person?
Throughout the story we are being on our toes, as we have been pulled into narrative, time and again, by the omnipotent, strange narrator but only to realize that we are still readers and could not really intrude into the narrative. The narrative moves from a deep awareness about the tragedy of being alive to a sly allowance for the fact that existence is a comedy, which me reminds of Kafka as he used to put his characters in seemingly contradictory absurd situations wherein every probable move by them put out misery and comedy of their existence. The protagonist of the story sees her annihilation as some sort of unfulfilled existence which lingers somewhere between life and death wherein the soul could not be freed from existential curse even after death.
I’ll myself so bad when I die
The Hour of the Star is a great work of endless interrogation wherein the author, the narrator, the protagonist and the reader (i.e. you) are interrogated by ever changing and unreliable narrative that bangs along and promises no tidy conclusion. While the narrator in The Hour of the Star reveals to the audience his wish to ensure the novel's simplicity (in terms of writing) and stray from philosophical tangents, in reality the story is marked by complicated existentialist notions of identity. The author often reflects on his conscious effort to do so. As the novel unfolds, it becomes apparent that this quest for identity is as much about Macabéa's search for self as it is the narrator's own. Notions of being, who we are and who we aren't, and the struggle to finding meaning are all touched upon. In fact, the book looks to be incomplete to an un-initiated eye since it leaves so many questions unanswered. But this is exactly how it has been written- to question, the very existence of everything, even that of the narrative or text itself which is being written about it; the book (and its narrative) is truly existential in nature.
Like every writer, I am clearly tempted to use succulent terms: I have at my command magnificent adjectives, robust nouns, and verbs so agile that they glide through the atmosphere as they move into action. For surely words are actions? Yet I have no intention of adorning the word, for were I to touch the girl's bread, that bread would turn to gold—and the girl … would be unable to bite into it, and consequently die of hunger.
February 19, 2021
“Who has not asked himself at some time or other: am I a monster or is this what it means to be a person?”
Clarice Lispector's The Hour of the Star is ostensibly about a young woman, Macabea, in Rio de Janeiro who has been crushed by poverty. However, the novel is even more revealing of the narrator who chooses to write about her. The narrator tells you why he's chosen to follow Macabea, something about her habits (she loves Coca Cola and wants to be like Marilyn Monroe) and her occupation (she is a typist, but not very good one). This leads you to believe the story is about Macabea. However, the more interesting subject is the narrator himself, his own position in Brazilian society as well as his speculative musings. Lispector casts off authorial privilege as the narrator wonders whether Macabea knows who she is, or whether he (the narrator) is imposing an identity on her. Enjoyed this! I'd like to read more Brazilain authors so suggestions are very welcome! Even for those who might not have an interest in Brazil, this is a quirky but engaging read! 4.5 stars
Clarice Lispector's The Hour of the Star is ostensibly about a young woman, Macabea, in Rio de Janeiro who has been crushed by poverty. However, the novel is even more revealing of the narrator who chooses to write about her. The narrator tells you why he's chosen to follow Macabea, something about her habits (she loves Coca Cola and wants to be like Marilyn Monroe) and her occupation (she is a typist, but not very good one). This leads you to believe the story is about Macabea. However, the more interesting subject is the narrator himself, his own position in Brazilian society as well as his speculative musings. Lispector casts off authorial privilege as the narrator wonders whether Macabea knows who she is, or whether he (the narrator) is imposing an identity on her. Enjoyed this! I'd like to read more Brazilain authors so suggestions are very welcome! Even for those who might not have an interest in Brazil, this is a quirky but engaging read! 4.5 stars
June 30, 2021
I returned to Clarice Lispector in the hopes of finding an appreciation for her that I missed in The Passion According to G.H., which confounded and tortured me in its nonsensical, philosophical maze. I hoped to redeem my less-than-stellar opinion of her by reading this, her last work.
Sadly, even in the first few paragraphs, I was sighing. Clarice! For fuck's sake... Clarice, as it turns out, is still Clarice.
And by that I mean, Clarice is a brilliant wackadoodle whose utter originality sets her in a class on her own. It is her signature, her snowflake, her own 148 pointed star. You will either love her, or not.
She's so slippery to read. I find nothingness in paragraphs that slide by, and I get this erroneous feeling that I could skip pages and not miss anything. That I could get to the end of her work with my eyes closed and be none the wiser. And then I read lines like this:
All the world began with a yes.
Thinking is an act. Feeling is a fact.
I write because I'm desperate and I'm tired, I can no longer bear the routine of being me and if not for the always novelty that is writing, I would die symbolically every day.
And I feel an admiration for her, even if she is so far away from me that I cannot touch her, in all her glorious nothingness.
I read somewhere that Clarice Lispector was not well read. She was like an innocent in the literary world, untainted by other books. She didn't know what it was to be 'kafka-esque' or compare herself with thinkers like Camus or Woolf. She came to her typewriter with a lack of self-consciousness, a purity, that is quite wonderful.
So when I approach this novelette, with its eccentric narrator who goes on (and on, and on) for about 1/4 of the time about simply the telling of the story without actually telling anything at all, when I listen to absurd dialogue punctuated with deep philosophical statements, when I follow the life of a character that I really don't know and about whom I feel more confusion than curiosity, when I am frustrated and bored with the relentless esoteric intensity, and get the sense that this writer was in love with her own mind more than anything else... I pause, and think - thank goodness for her, this unicorn of the written word, who brought herself to her art, whether you like it or not.
Sadly, even in the first few paragraphs, I was sighing. Clarice! For fuck's sake... Clarice, as it turns out, is still Clarice.
And by that I mean, Clarice is a brilliant wackadoodle whose utter originality sets her in a class on her own. It is her signature, her snowflake, her own 148 pointed star. You will either love her, or not.
She's so slippery to read. I find nothingness in paragraphs that slide by, and I get this erroneous feeling that I could skip pages and not miss anything. That I could get to the end of her work with my eyes closed and be none the wiser. And then I read lines like this:
All the world began with a yes.
Thinking is an act. Feeling is a fact.
I write because I'm desperate and I'm tired, I can no longer bear the routine of being me and if not for the always novelty that is writing, I would die symbolically every day.
And I feel an admiration for her, even if she is so far away from me that I cannot touch her, in all her glorious nothingness.
I read somewhere that Clarice Lispector was not well read. She was like an innocent in the literary world, untainted by other books. She didn't know what it was to be 'kafka-esque' or compare herself with thinkers like Camus or Woolf. She came to her typewriter with a lack of self-consciousness, a purity, that is quite wonderful.
So when I approach this novelette, with its eccentric narrator who goes on (and on, and on) for about 1/4 of the time about simply the telling of the story without actually telling anything at all, when I listen to absurd dialogue punctuated with deep philosophical statements, when I follow the life of a character that I really don't know and about whom I feel more confusion than curiosity, when I am frustrated and bored with the relentless esoteric intensity, and get the sense that this writer was in love with her own mind more than anything else... I pause, and think - thank goodness for her, this unicorn of the written word, who brought herself to her art, whether you like it or not.
May 27, 2021
Como me ha encantado el relato sobre esta Amelie nordestina sin encanto alguno llamada Macabea. ¿Ninguno? Bueno, digamos que uno raro.
Y qué decir de Macabea, con ese nombre que parece una “enfermedad de la piel”, que solo a través de otros sabe de la desdicha de su propia vida, “tan tonta que a veces sonríe a los demás en la calle”, maltratada, ridiculizada, invisible, sin voz, sin grito, “que debería haberse quedado en el sertão de Alagoas con su vestido de algodón y sin nada de mecanografía”… un maravilloso personaje que “no sabe más que llover”, como un día le suelta a bocajarro, en uno de esos diálogos crueles, vacíos, tristes y esperpénticos que mantenía con su único amante, el que ni siquiera llegó a serlo: Olímpico de Jesús, otro nordestino, otro hijo del lumpen, pero con alma de trepa y diente de oro.
Que más decir, querida Clarice, que para ser alguien que desconfía tanto de las palabras, no puedo sino rendirme a tu portentosa sabiduría en mezclarlas y en conseguir un novelón de tan solo 88 páginas y sin “lagrimear tonterías”.
"Hay los que tienen. Y hay los que no tienen. Es muy simple: la muchacha no tenía."Una historia melodramática-romántica-paródica acerca de una víctima de todos, un relato sobre alguien “tan insignificante como una idiota. Sólo que no lo era.”, a la que el narrador, tercer protagonista de la novela y que se siente obligado a escribir la historia, quiere satisfacer con “el derecho al grito” que la propia antiheroína se queda muy lejos de ejercer. Y este dejar constancia de una de esas personas que nunca dejan constancia, y de las que nunca nadie se preocupa por dejar constancia, está escrito con un particularísimo estilo que hace verdaderamente grande a la novela.
“… capté el espíritu de la lengua y así, a veces, la forma forja un contenido.”Este narrador, que escribe porque no tiene otra cosa que hacer en el mundo y con la esperanza de que ello lo aleje de sí mismo, consigue que me deleite y emocione incluso con párrafos que no entiendo (aunque permanece en mí la pequeñita sospecha de que quizás sí, siempre prefiero la comprensión que proviene de la emoción y así poder decir con el narrador aquello de que “Lo definible ya me cansa. Prefiero la verdad que hay en el presagio.”). Un narrador que envidia el vacío que representa Macabea porque “El vacío tiene el valor de lo pleno y se asemeja a ello”, y que, sin embargo, se incomoda y hasta se enfurece por la falta de reacción de Macabea. Quizá le recuerda demasiado a sí mismo.
Y qué decir de Macabea, con ese nombre que parece una “enfermedad de la piel”, que solo a través de otros sabe de la desdicha de su propia vida, “tan tonta que a veces sonríe a los demás en la calle”, maltratada, ridiculizada, invisible, sin voz, sin grito, “que debería haberse quedado en el sertão de Alagoas con su vestido de algodón y sin nada de mecanografía”… un maravilloso personaje que “no sabe más que llover”, como un día le suelta a bocajarro, en uno de esos diálogos crueles, vacíos, tristes y esperpénticos que mantenía con su único amante, el que ni siquiera llegó a serlo: Olímpico de Jesús, otro nordestino, otro hijo del lumpen, pero con alma de trepa y diente de oro.
Que más decir, querida Clarice, que para ser alguien que desconfía tanto de las palabras, no puedo sino rendirme a tu portentosa sabiduría en mezclarlas y en conseguir un novelón de tan solo 88 páginas y sin “lagrimear tonterías”.
November 26, 2023
Poor Macabéa, a girl who has been dealt such bad cards by life. There isn't a lot of traditional plot. It's simply the story of this young woman. She never knew her parents who died of typhoid when she was two. She was raised by a stern aunt who had no real interest in her or affection for her. As a girl she would kiss the wall to get a kind of substitute affection.
This is a typical book by Lispector in the sense that it consists of intense inner monologues and streams of consciousness by her characters, but in this book, a novella of 90 pages, these features are in fairly short passages.
The book is a meta-novel in the sense that the narrator is a supposed author (a male) who is writing the book about our anti-heroine and her hard nondescript life. The fictional author explains to the reader why he is writing the novel and discusses the literary choices he makes in this story as he goes along. In the afterword we are told that Lispector frequently explored her creative process during the narration as she does in this book. Since it’s a novella, I guess we can call it a ‘meta-novella.’
At various times we hear Macabéa called 'simple-witted' and 'inept for living.' “… she did not think about God, nor did God think about her.”
The girl works as a low-paid typist and lives in a rooming house with four other young women in the Rio slums. Her typing skills are poor and she is under threat of dismissal. She has no friends and hardly any interaction even with the women she lives with.
No one ever gave her a gift in her life. She owns no warm clothing and shivers in thin clothes in winter. She is often called ugly. She is skinny, perhaps anorexic. She doesn't bathe frequently and smells. She seldom eats anything besides hotdogs and Coca-Cola. She does not know what spaghetti is. She doesn't know how to use cosmetics and she can't afford them anyway.
“…and yet it was in her nature to be happy.” She is thrilled to borrow some instant coffee and boiling water from the landlord.
We are told several times that the girl is originally from northeast Brazil. People there live hardscrabble lives, and in the past, sometimes starved. That is the poorest part of Brazil and almost everyone from that region is of mixed race. All these things are mentioned several times in the novel. “Truly she seems to have been conceived from some vague notion in the minds of her starving parents.”
The author (Lispector) was born in that region and when she wrote this book near the end of her life we are told she started making trips back to the area because she was overcome with nostalgia for where she grew up. (Not that her family was among those starving: her family sent her to college and law school.) Many of the young girls from that area became prostitutes in the big Brazilian cities.
The author’s brilliant writing shows throughout the book. You could take many philosophical nuggets that the author gives us as one-liners in the book and make them into wall posters or something that you might post on Facebook. Some examples:
“Happiness? I have never come across a more foolish word, invented by all those unfortunate girls from northeastern Brazil.”
“Everything in the world began with a yes.”
“I only achieve simplicity with enormous effort.”
“So long as I have questions to which there are no answers, I shall go on writing.”
“How does one start at the beginning, if things happen before they actually happen?”
In an afterword, the translator discusses various meanings we can ascribe to the book. I lean toward it being about the psychological consequences of poverty aggravated by perverse twists of fortune. Hour of the Star was good, but I liked her Near to the Wild Heart better, so I gave it a ‘4.’
In 1943 the author burst onto the literary stage in Brazil at the age of 23 with the publication of her first novel, Near to the Wild Heart. It won Brazil’s most prestigious literary award. I reviewed that one and have it in my favorites.
Lispector was born in 1920 in Ukraine to Jewish parents but came to Brazil as an infant. One critic called her “the most important Jewish writer since Kafka.” She died from cancer in 1977 when she was only 57.
Top photo of favelas of Brazil from panoramas.pitt.edu
Street Market, Rua do Lavradio, painting by Jader on novica.com
The author from irishtimes.com
[Edited for typos 4/21/23, 11/26/23]
This is a typical book by Lispector in the sense that it consists of intense inner monologues and streams of consciousness by her characters, but in this book, a novella of 90 pages, these features are in fairly short passages.
The book is a meta-novel in the sense that the narrator is a supposed author (a male) who is writing the book about our anti-heroine and her hard nondescript life. The fictional author explains to the reader why he is writing the novel and discusses the literary choices he makes in this story as he goes along. In the afterword we are told that Lispector frequently explored her creative process during the narration as she does in this book. Since it’s a novella, I guess we can call it a ‘meta-novella.’
At various times we hear Macabéa called 'simple-witted' and 'inept for living.' “… she did not think about God, nor did God think about her.”
The girl works as a low-paid typist and lives in a rooming house with four other young women in the Rio slums. Her typing skills are poor and she is under threat of dismissal. She has no friends and hardly any interaction even with the women she lives with.
No one ever gave her a gift in her life. She owns no warm clothing and shivers in thin clothes in winter. She is often called ugly. She is skinny, perhaps anorexic. She doesn't bathe frequently and smells. She seldom eats anything besides hotdogs and Coca-Cola. She does not know what spaghetti is. She doesn't know how to use cosmetics and she can't afford them anyway.
“…and yet it was in her nature to be happy.” She is thrilled to borrow some instant coffee and boiling water from the landlord.
We are told several times that the girl is originally from northeast Brazil. People there live hardscrabble lives, and in the past, sometimes starved. That is the poorest part of Brazil and almost everyone from that region is of mixed race. All these things are mentioned several times in the novel. “Truly she seems to have been conceived from some vague notion in the minds of her starving parents.”
The author (Lispector) was born in that region and when she wrote this book near the end of her life we are told she started making trips back to the area because she was overcome with nostalgia for where she grew up. (Not that her family was among those starving: her family sent her to college and law school.) Many of the young girls from that area became prostitutes in the big Brazilian cities.
The author’s brilliant writing shows throughout the book. You could take many philosophical nuggets that the author gives us as one-liners in the book and make them into wall posters or something that you might post on Facebook. Some examples:
“Happiness? I have never come across a more foolish word, invented by all those unfortunate girls from northeastern Brazil.”
“Everything in the world began with a yes.”
“I only achieve simplicity with enormous effort.”
“So long as I have questions to which there are no answers, I shall go on writing.”
“How does one start at the beginning, if things happen before they actually happen?”
In an afterword, the translator discusses various meanings we can ascribe to the book. I lean toward it being about the psychological consequences of poverty aggravated by perverse twists of fortune. Hour of the Star was good, but I liked her Near to the Wild Heart better, so I gave it a ‘4.’
In 1943 the author burst onto the literary stage in Brazil at the age of 23 with the publication of her first novel, Near to the Wild Heart. It won Brazil’s most prestigious literary award. I reviewed that one and have it in my favorites.
Lispector was born in 1920 in Ukraine to Jewish parents but came to Brazil as an infant. One critic called her “the most important Jewish writer since Kafka.” She died from cancer in 1977 when she was only 57.
Top photo of favelas of Brazil from panoramas.pitt.edu
Street Market, Rua do Lavradio, painting by Jader on novica.com
The author from irishtimes.com
[Edited for typos 4/21/23, 11/26/23]
December 19, 2019
The Lispector Calls
The Hour of the Star transcends genre. How, with utter fluidity, does an apparently conventional narrative transform itself into the author's introspective confessional? And when does that slip into narcissistic myopia which then becomes therapeutic technique? Before it develops simultaneously into a romance, a feminist tract, and a pointed sociological commentary? All in 90 pages?
Clarice Lispector is difficult to keep up with simply because she writes the simplest prose with undoubtedly the highest ratio of thought to word on the planet. It takes time to digest. One can open to any page to find a dozen arresting examples:
"... The truth is always some inner power without explanation..."
"... Remember that, no matter what I write, my basic material is the word which combines with other words to form phrases and [from which] there emanates a secret meaning that exceeds both words and phrases."
"... God belongs to those who succeed in pinning him down.... Why is there so much God? At the expense of men."
"... what is fully mature is very close to rotting."
"... Death is an encounter with self."
The reader is bounced on her sea of prose like a survivor from a wrecked civilisation. With more pensees per page than Pascal, meatier aphorisms than Montaigne, contradictions and reversals to challenge the Bible, and offbeat observations to rival Borges, Poe and Kafka, if you like your fiction and your thinking densely packaged, you cannot go wrong with Lispector.
The Hour of the Star transcends genre. How, with utter fluidity, does an apparently conventional narrative transform itself into the author's introspective confessional? And when does that slip into narcissistic myopia which then becomes therapeutic technique? Before it develops simultaneously into a romance, a feminist tract, and a pointed sociological commentary? All in 90 pages?
Clarice Lispector is difficult to keep up with simply because she writes the simplest prose with undoubtedly the highest ratio of thought to word on the planet. It takes time to digest. One can open to any page to find a dozen arresting examples:
"... The truth is always some inner power without explanation..."
"... Remember that, no matter what I write, my basic material is the word which combines with other words to form phrases and [from which] there emanates a secret meaning that exceeds both words and phrases."
"... God belongs to those who succeed in pinning him down.... Why is there so much God? At the expense of men."
"... what is fully mature is very close to rotting."
"... Death is an encounter with self."
The reader is bounced on her sea of prose like a survivor from a wrecked civilisation. With more pensees per page than Pascal, meatier aphorisms than Montaigne, contradictions and reversals to challenge the Bible, and offbeat observations to rival Borges, Poe and Kafka, if you like your fiction and your thinking densely packaged, you cannot go wrong with Lispector.
March 12, 2024
In this remarkable novella Clarice Lispector uses an intricate narrative structure in order to represent a peculiar state of mind, something I found utterly refreshing. That mind belongs to Rodrigo, a well-off and cultured man, struggles to tell the story of Macabéa, an unhygienic, sickly, unlovable, completely forgettable person, and an altogether unideal typist living in the slums of Rio de Janeiro. She is taken almost directly from stereotype. What Lispector does with her however, is investigate the psychological consequences of poverty.
Macabea’s ignorance does not spare her from fear or loneliness but perversely it does leave her prepared for the misery that confounds in her in a way. Within Macabea is some resilience and a will to survive. Not with the pomp and thrust of the privileged. Although Rodrigo claims he's the only person who could love Macabéa - if only because she's the subject of his narrative - he really tells her story as a way to thwart his own weariness and isolation. Lispector employs odd sentence fragments and erratic grammatical choices to highlight the importance of imagination as a means for her characters to liberate themselves from their banal existences. Through Rodrigo's narrative, Lispector artfully ponders the fate of her characters, and their fears and desires, set against a harsh and unforgiving cityscape.
Despite the narrators protestation of emotional detachment, we see a man wailing endlessly for the disaster that is Macabea. He may state things that are unthinkable, but his passion for her plight shines through every one of his words. Despite this, the narrative comes at us from within the narrator, we see the story wriggling out of him. He creates a relationship with between himself and Macabea, between reason and instinct, knowledge and innocence, the imagination and reality. One of the most incredible aspects of Clarice Lispector's style is her ability to work from abstracts. She does not launch from a firm platform. She is able to work from emotion to give credence to the most ludicrous of Macabea’s summations about her day. We are convinced by both the narrator's perspective and by Macabea’s. The book deals with the enormity of the human condition, a philosophical subject far beyond the reach of Macabea’s ability to grasp, and yet Macabea is able to experience her own resonance. Mostly with the simple question - Who am I?
Lispector herself defined her book as one ‘made without words...a mute photograph...a silence...a question’. And I can see what she is getting at. The tale of Macabéa can be read at different levels and lends itself to various interpretations. The book’s subtle interplay of fiction and philosophy sums up Lispector’s unique talent as a writer and her lasting influence on the contemporary world.
Startlingly original The Hour of the Star trips up our concept of the novel. What a story is expected to do. How characters act. Why writers write. Why readers read. It's an experience to savour. Bewildering as it was brilliant, magical as it was bleak, touching as it was discomforting. It was like being taken through a labyrinth of emotion. It seemed at every turn a different mindset was waiting. The outside world simply didn't exist whilst I was fully engaged within it's pages. I found it so mesmerizing I actually read it again this morning (obviously it helped being under 100 pages).
April 23, 2018
A to Z around the world personal challenge - B is for Brazil
As you can see, my challenge is progressing badly together with my reading in general. Due to life I did not have the time or the mood to read anything for the past 2-3 weeks and I also made a swift disappearance from here. I hope I'm back to reading and to GR but I can't be sure.
I finished The Hour of The Star three weeks ago and I waited for the inspiration to hit me so I can write a meaningful review. As that did not happen a few mumbling words will have to do.
When I first started this novella I was sure I was going to hate it. I don't really like pretentious writers who do their best to sound complicated and confuse the reader. However, as I progressed, I discovered that I warmed up to the author and the writing.
“All the world began with a yes. One molecule said yes to another molecule and life was born. But before prehistory there was the prehistory of the prehistory and there was the never and there was the yes. It was ever so. I don’t know why, but I do know that the universe never began.
Make no mistake, I only achieve simplicity with enormous effort.”
As you can see, even the writer/narrator tells us she has problems with simplicity. What we have here is a "wordy" and philosophical narrator who sets out to tell the story of a poor girl from North of Brasil but while doing so talks a lot more about himself, his reason for writing and the struggle to create a story. In the narrators's own words: “The story, I determine - with false free will - will have around seven characters and I am obviously one of the more important.” this statement is contrary to his goal in the novel which is to tell the story of the girl as humbly as possible. It is almost comical how the narrator starts to write about the girl then comes back to his struggles as writer and back to the story.
There is no plot to be found here, not really, but I found myself sucked in and looking forward to see where the narrator takes me. it was different reading experience.
As you can see, my challenge is progressing badly together with my reading in general. Due to life I did not have the time or the mood to read anything for the past 2-3 weeks and I also made a swift disappearance from here. I hope I'm back to reading and to GR but I can't be sure.
I finished The Hour of The Star three weeks ago and I waited for the inspiration to hit me so I can write a meaningful review. As that did not happen a few mumbling words will have to do.
When I first started this novella I was sure I was going to hate it. I don't really like pretentious writers who do their best to sound complicated and confuse the reader. However, as I progressed, I discovered that I warmed up to the author and the writing.
“All the world began with a yes. One molecule said yes to another molecule and life was born. But before prehistory there was the prehistory of the prehistory and there was the never and there was the yes. It was ever so. I don’t know why, but I do know that the universe never began.
Make no mistake, I only achieve simplicity with enormous effort.”
As you can see, even the writer/narrator tells us she has problems with simplicity. What we have here is a "wordy" and philosophical narrator who sets out to tell the story of a poor girl from North of Brasil but while doing so talks a lot more about himself, his reason for writing and the struggle to create a story. In the narrators's own words: “The story, I determine - with false free will - will have around seven characters and I am obviously one of the more important.” this statement is contrary to his goal in the novel which is to tell the story of the girl as humbly as possible. It is almost comical how the narrator starts to write about the girl then comes back to his struggles as writer and back to the story.
There is no plot to be found here, not really, but I found myself sucked in and looking forward to see where the narrator takes me. it was different reading experience.
June 30, 2021
No matter how odd Clarice Lispector's prose sounds in translation, it sounds just as unusual in the original--Benjamin Moser
If Professor Trelawney, the Divination professor over at Hogwarts, had ever written a novel, I'm pretty sure it would have read exactly like this one.
For those of you who aren't familiar with the Divination teacher at Hogwarts, she's a faculty member that the headmaster keeps on staff, despite her nonsensical speech and dubious syllabus. Unbeknownst to Sybill Trelawney, she has the occasional power of true prophecy, and therein lies her value.
It goes a little like this, with Professor Trelawney:
Blah blah blah, blah blah blah, blah blah blah, PROPHECY!
Blah blah blah, blah blah blah, blah blah blah, PROPHECY!
You may be wondering why I'm blathering on about a character from Harry Potter, but if, by any chance, you've read the series, and you have also read this novel, I don't think you'll be at all surprised by my comparison.
The real author of this novella from 1977, Clarice Lispector, looked like this:
And, though I know very little about her, I can tell you that she must have been at least one part feral, one part prophet and one part genius.
With this book, it went a little something like:
Blah blah blah, blah blah blah, blah blah blah, I write because I have nothing else to do in the world: I was left over and there is no place for me. . .
Blah blah blah, blah blah blah, blah blah blah, I'll miss myself so bad when I die.
This novella intrigued me, bored me, and broke my heart, too.
Reading this story is like making out with drywall.
If Professor Trelawney, the Divination professor over at Hogwarts, had ever written a novel, I'm pretty sure it would have read exactly like this one.
For those of you who aren't familiar with the Divination teacher at Hogwarts, she's a faculty member that the headmaster keeps on staff, despite her nonsensical speech and dubious syllabus. Unbeknownst to Sybill Trelawney, she has the occasional power of true prophecy, and therein lies her value.
It goes a little like this, with Professor Trelawney:
Blah blah blah, blah blah blah, blah blah blah, PROPHECY!
Blah blah blah, blah blah blah, blah blah blah, PROPHECY!
You may be wondering why I'm blathering on about a character from Harry Potter, but if, by any chance, you've read the series, and you have also read this novel, I don't think you'll be at all surprised by my comparison.
The real author of this novella from 1977, Clarice Lispector, looked like this:
And, though I know very little about her, I can tell you that she must have been at least one part feral, one part prophet and one part genius.
With this book, it went a little something like:
Blah blah blah, blah blah blah, blah blah blah, I write because I have nothing else to do in the world: I was left over and there is no place for me. . .
Blah blah blah, blah blah blah, blah blah blah, I'll miss myself so bad when I die.
This novella intrigued me, bored me, and broke my heart, too.
Reading this story is like making out with drywall.
October 31, 2017
«Ζεσταίνω το σώμα για να ξεκινήσω, τρίβοντας κάθε τόσο τα χέρια το ένα στο άλλο για να πάρω κουράγιο»
Με αυτά τα λόγια ξεκινάει την ιστορία ο Ροντρίγο Σ. Μ.
Είναι ο συγγραφέας-δημιούργημα της
Κλαρίσε Λισπέκτορ και μέσα απο τα λόγια του, τις σκέψεις του, τα συναισθήματα του, μαθαίνουμε την τραγικά τρυφερή ιστορία της «Ώρας του Αστεριού».
Στην ουσία η Λισπέκτορ απο σεβασμό, λεπτότητα και απέραντη αγάπη γι’αυτό το αστεράκι που λάμπει μέσα στο βιβλιο της, συνδέεται πνευματικά με έναν άνδρα συγγραφέα που είναι η ίδια.
Μα μέσα απο την ανδρική επινοημένη υπόσταση του συγγραφέα που μας αφηγείται την ιστορία υπάρχει μια ιερή αποστολή. Ο άνδρας συγγραφέας (Λισπέκτορ) είναι πιο κατάλληλος για να αγαπήσει πολύ και να σεβαστεί την ηρωίδα που δημιουργεί. Να ταυτιστεί μαζί της, να πονέσει,να μονάσει,να φτωχύνει, να αποσυρθεί, να πεθάνει.
«Να μην ξεχνάμε πως η δομή του ατόμου δεν είναι ορατή μα τη γνωρίζουμε. Ξέρω πολλά που δεν τα έχω δει. Κι εσείς το ίδιο. Δεν γίνεται να δοθούν πειστήρια ύπαρξης γι’ αυτό που είναι πιο αληθινό, το ουσιώδες είναι να πιστεύεις. Να πιστεύεις κλαίγοντας»
Και έτσι, αποκαθαρμένος, έχοντας απαρνηθεί κάθε απόλαυση και ζώντας σε μια ακραία ανθρώπινη κατάσταση χωρίς έλεος μπορεί να ταυτιστεί με το αστεράκι.
Με αυτό το αστεράκι που στην απέραντοσύνη της νύχτας ήταν τόσο ασήμαντο, έμοιαζε με αραχνούλα ή με μικροσκοπικό πλασματάκι, ανθρώπινο.
Μα στην έννοια του θανάτου παίρνει τεράστιες διαστάσεις και μεγάλη σπουδαιότητα. Απο τη σκοπιά των άστρων φαινόταν τόσο σημαντική ύπαρξη όσο οποιοσδήποτε σημαντικός η ασήμαντος στη γη μας.
Αυτό το ασήμαντο,διάφανο και αδιόρατο πλάσμα ονομάζεται Μακκαμπέα. Το βιβλίο αυτό που γράφτηκε για τη Μακκαμπέα δείχνει μικρό και λεπτό, ισχνό και ανάλαφρο.
Μα είναι ένα κείμενο σαν βουβός ψαλμός επικήδειος, σαν κύκνειο άσμα στο θάνατο. Είναι ένα απο τα μεγάλα βιβλία του κόσμου.
Η Μακκαμπέα ήταν μια κοπέλα που
«φυλαγόταν απ’ τον θάνατο ζώντας λειψά, ξοδεύοντας λίγο από τη ζωή της για να μην τελειώσει».
Ορφανή απο μωράκι, μεγαλωμένη απο μια θεία που η πιο έντονη ανάμνηση που της άφησε ήταν τα δυνατά χτυπήματα στο κεφάλι.
Μελόδραμα; Όχι.
Γολγοθάς ανάγνωσης. Ικεσία, θλίψη και συμπόνοια για τις ψυχές που κατοικούν σε σώματα ανθρώπων που απευχόμαστε προσευχόμενοι να μην είναι ποτέ τα δικά μας. Το δικό μου, το δικό σου, του παιδιού σου, του αγαπημένου σου.
Ψυχές που περισσεύουν και δεν υπάρχει μέρος γι’αυτές πάνω στη γη.
Ίσως τα αστέρια στον ουρανό να δείξουν μεγαλύτερη συμπόνοια και κατανόηση. Να λυτρώνουν, να εξομοιώνουν τα πάντα πεθαίνοντας, ενώ φώτιζαν όσο ζούσαν το μυστήριο της Ανάστασης τους.
Η Μακκαμπέα λοιπόν,
μια παρθένα που βρομούσε ιδρώτα, μια μεσαιωνική φιγούρα με κυρτούς ώμους, βαμμένα κόκκινα νύχια μα φαγωμένα τόσο όσο να φαίνεται η μαυρίλα απο κάτω.
Μια γυναίκα τόσο ασήμαντη που προκαλεί ενδιαφέρον. Τίποτα επάνω της δε θύμιζε τη θηλυκή της φύση. Οι ωοθήκες της σαν νερόβραστο μανιτάρι νεκρές, πάμφτωχη, πεινασμένη, σκελετωμένη και ιδιαίτερη.
Δεν γνωρίζει ποια είναι, τι θέλει, γιατί ζει.
Παρόλα αυτά δεν είναι θλιμμένη και έχει μια απροσδιόριστη δυναμική. Μια θέληση να νικήσει την απόρριψη αφού δεν ανήκε σε κανέναν,ούτε στον ίδιο της τον εαυτό.
«Η Μακκαμπέα, ξέχασα να πω, είχε μια δυστυχία: ήταν αισθησιακή. Πώς γίνεται σ΄ένα τόσο σαρακοφαγωμένο σώμα όπως το δικό της να χωρά τόση λαγνεία, εν αγνοία της; Μυστήριο.»
Ολομόναχη και ξεχασμένη αποζητά απεγνωσμένα ελευθερία.
Κατάγεται απο το Νορντέστε, όπου μεγάλωσε ( μια άθλια περιοχή της Βραζιλίας).
Με τη «σπλαχνική» θεία μετακομίζει στο Ρίο και μετά το θάνατο της, εργάζεται ως δακτυλογράφος,ενώ συγκατοικεί με άλλες τέσσερις κοπέλες στη μεγάλη πόλη.
Πιστεύει πως είναι αθάνατη και ζει κάθε στιγμή με έντονη συναίσθηση και αντίσυμβατικότητα μέσα στην πλήρη δυστυχία της.
Η «Ώρα του αστεριού» μια βουβή και δύσκολη ιστορία.
Μια άχρονη ώρα που κινεί τη ζωή προς το θάνατο.
Μονόδρομος. Έτσι κι αλλιώς.
Μπορεί όμως να μας δείξει ξεκάθαρα την ταπεινότητα ως χαρά, την απόλυτη φτώχεια ως θησαυρό, τον πόνο ως ευτυχία, το κλάμα ως χάδι παρηγοριάς, το χωρισμό ως ένωση και το θάνατο ως ζωή.
«Είναι τόσο ωραίο το να ζεις, δεν είναι;».
✨💫✨💫🌟💫🌟💫🌟💫🌟💫🌟💫🌟💫🌟
Καλή ανάγνωση.
Πολλούς ασπασμούς.
Με αυτά τα λόγια ξεκινάει την ιστορία ο Ροντρίγο Σ. Μ.
Είναι ο συγγραφέας-δημιούργημα της
Κλαρίσε Λισπέκτορ και μέσα απο τα λόγια του, τις σκέψεις του, τα συναισθήματα του, μαθαίνουμε την τραγικά τρυφερή ιστορία της «Ώρας του Αστεριού».
Στην ουσία η Λισπέκτορ απο σεβασμό, λεπτότητα και απέραντη αγάπη γι’αυτό το αστεράκι που λάμπει μέσα στο βιβλιο της, συνδέεται πνευματικά με έναν άνδρα συγγραφέα που είναι η ίδια.
Μα μέσα απο την ανδρική επινοημένη υπόσταση του συγγραφέα που μας αφηγείται την ιστορία υπάρχει μια ιερή αποστολή. Ο άνδρας συγγραφέας (Λισπέκτορ) είναι πιο κατάλληλος για να αγαπήσει πολύ και να σεβαστεί την ηρωίδα που δημιουργεί. Να ταυτιστεί μαζί της, να πονέσει,να μονάσει,να φτωχύνει, να αποσυρθεί, να πεθάνει.
«Να μην ξεχνάμε πως η δομή του ατόμου δεν είναι ορατή μα τη γνωρίζουμε. Ξέρω πολλά που δεν τα έχω δει. Κι εσείς το ίδιο. Δεν γίνεται να δοθούν πειστήρια ύπαρξης γι’ αυτό που είναι πιο αληθινό, το ουσιώδες είναι να πιστεύεις. Να πιστεύεις κλαίγοντας»
Και έτσι, αποκαθαρμένος, έχοντας απαρνηθεί κάθε απόλαυση και ζώντας σε μια ακραία ανθρώπινη κατάσταση χωρίς έλεος μπορεί να ταυτιστεί με το αστεράκι.
Με αυτό το αστεράκι που στην απέραντοσύνη της νύχτας ήταν τόσο ασήμαντο, έμοιαζε με αραχνούλα ή με μικροσκοπικό πλασματάκι, ανθρώπινο.
Μα στην έννοια του θανάτου παίρνει τεράστιες διαστάσεις και μεγάλη σπουδαιότητα. Απο τη σκοπιά των άστρων φαινόταν τόσο σημαντική ύπαρξη όσο οποιοσδήποτε σημαντικός η ασήμαντος στη γη μας.
Αυτό το ασήμαντο,διάφανο και αδιόρατο πλάσμα ονομάζεται Μακκαμπέα. Το βιβλίο αυτό που γράφτηκε για τη Μακκαμπέα δείχνει μικρό και λεπτό, ισχνό και ανάλαφρο.
Μα είναι ένα κείμενο σαν βουβός ψαλμός επικήδειος, σαν κύκνειο άσμα στο θάνατο. Είναι ένα απο τα μεγάλα βιβλία του κόσμου.
Η Μακκαμπέα ήταν μια κοπέλα που
«φυλαγόταν απ’ τον θάνατο ζώντας λειψά, ξοδεύοντας λίγο από τη ζωή της για να μην τελειώσει».
Ορφανή απο μωράκι, μεγαλωμένη απο μια θεία που η πιο έντονη ανάμνηση που της άφησε ήταν τα δυνατά χτυπήματα στο κεφάλι.
Μελόδραμα; Όχι.
Γολγοθάς ανάγνωσης. Ικεσία, θλίψη και συμπόνοια για τις ψυχές που κατοικούν σε σώματα ανθρώπων που απευχόμαστε προσευχόμενοι να μην είναι ποτέ τα δικά μας. Το δικό μου, το δικό σου, του παιδιού σου, του αγαπημένου σου.
Ψυχές που περισσεύουν και δεν υπάρχει μέρος γι’αυτές πάνω στη γη.
Ίσως τα αστέρια στον ουρανό να δείξουν μεγαλύτερη συμπόνοια και κατανόηση. Να λυτρώνουν, να εξομοιώνουν τα πάντα πεθαίνοντας, ενώ φώτιζαν όσο ζούσαν το μυστήριο της Ανάστασης τους.
Η Μακκαμπέα λοιπόν,
μια παρθένα που βρομούσε ιδρώτα, μια μεσαιωνική φιγούρα με κυρτούς ώμους, βαμμένα κόκκινα νύχια μα φαγωμένα τόσο όσο να φαίνεται η μαυρίλα απο κάτω.
Μια γυναίκα τόσο ασήμαντη που προκαλεί ενδιαφέρον. Τίποτα επάνω της δε θύμιζε τη θηλυκή της φύση. Οι ωοθήκες της σαν νερόβραστο μανιτάρι νεκρές, πάμφτωχη, πεινασμένη, σκελετωμένη και ιδιαίτερη.
Δεν γνωρίζει ποια είναι, τι θέλει, γιατί ζει.
Παρόλα αυτά δεν είναι θλιμμένη και έχει μια απροσδιόριστη δυναμική. Μια θέληση να νικήσει την απόρριψη αφού δεν ανήκε σε κανέναν,ούτε στον ίδιο της τον εαυτό.
«Η Μακκαμπέα, ξέχασα να πω, είχε μια δυστυχία: ήταν αισθησιακή. Πώς γίνεται σ΄ένα τόσο σαρακοφαγωμένο σώμα όπως το δικό της να χωρά τόση λαγνεία, εν αγνοία της; Μυστήριο.»
Ολομόναχη και ξεχασμένη αποζητά απεγνωσμένα ελευθερία.
Κατάγεται απο το Νορντέστε, όπου μεγάλωσε ( μια άθλια περιοχή της Βραζιλίας).
Με τη «σπλαχνική» θεία μετακομίζει στο Ρίο και μετά το θάνατο της, εργάζεται ως δακτυλογράφος,ενώ συγκατοικεί με άλλες τέσσερις κοπέλες στη μεγάλη πόλη.
Πιστεύει πως είναι αθάνατη και ζει κάθε στιγμή με έντονη συναίσθηση και αντίσυμβατικότητα μέσα στην πλήρη δυστυχία της.
Η «Ώρα του αστεριού» μια βουβή και δύσκολη ιστορία.
Μια άχρονη ώρα που κινεί τη ζωή προς το θάνατο.
Μονόδρομος. Έτσι κι αλλιώς.
Μπορεί όμως να μας δείξει ξεκάθαρα την ταπεινότητα ως χαρά, την απόλυτη φτώχεια ως θησαυρό, τον πόνο ως ευτυχία, το κλάμα ως χάδι παρηγοριάς, το χωρισμό ως ένωση και το θάνατο ως ζωή.
«Είναι τόσο ωραίο το να ζεις, δεν είναι;».
✨💫✨💫🌟💫🌟💫🌟💫🌟💫🌟💫🌟💫🌟
Καλή ανάγνωση.
Πολλούς ασπασμούς.
September 4, 2017
At times known as the greatest Jewish writer since Kafka, Clarice Lispector was one of the foremost Brazilian writers of the 20th century. Born Chaya Pinkhasovna, her family emigrated from the Ukraine to Recife, Brazil when young Chaya was a little more than a year old. It was in the northeastern corner of South America's largest country that Lispector found the inspiration for her life's work: writing. The Hour of the Star is called by many to be her greatest work, published within a year of her death in 1977. Because this novella is an entry in 500 Great Books By Women by Erica Bauermeister, I was intrigued to read this unique view on life and death amid the slums of Rio de Janeiro.
Lispector chooses to make Brazilian poverty, still a hot button issue today, as the focus of her last novel. In the opening pages, it is unclear who the novel's main protagonist is, but after an opening stream of consciousness monologue, we meet Macabea, who has come to Rio from Alagoas, close to Lispector's home state of Recife. While the Pinkhasovna family became Americanized almost immediately upon arrival in Brazil, Lispector consequently did not write about Jewish themes; however, as her own mortality loomed, she created a character in Macabea, who was both Jewish and autobiographical. Sharing my own family's Ukrainian origins, the I found the concept of a character based on the Macabees intriguing, and I was able to empathize with Macabea once I got past the surreal opening existential sequence.
Macabea was rejected from childhood. Her parents both passed away, and she was raised by an aunt who resembled an evil stepmother. She deprived Macabea of all joys in life, physically beating to the point of sterility. As soon as Macabea came of age in Alagoas, the aunt wanted to be rid of her and sent her packing to a cramped apartment in the red light slum district of Brazil. One could not help but feel for sorry for this protagonist: she was ugly yet did not realize it, a virgin, too poor to eat much more than Coca Cola and coffee without milk, and only got paid from her boss as an afterthought. Macabea evokes a mixture of Cinderella, an adult Cosette, and Eliza Doolittle before she was rescued from poverty. In a nutshell, Macabea is an ugly duckling of the world with no future as she lives in the slums of Rio, one of the world's most impoverished neighborhoods. It would take a miracle to save this young woman who unfortunately does not realize how horrendous her existence is.
Even the other characters in this novella view Macabea as beyond salvation. Olimpico comes from the same town in northeastern Brazil and befriends her not as a boyfriend, but because he feels sorry for her bleak life. Yet, Macabea is too dim to realize this and pins false hopes on their almost nonexistent relationship. Adding to sorrow is that Macabea naively introduces Olimpico to her sensuous co-worker Gloria and the two immediately become a couple. Each succeeding paragraph adds to Macabea's grief, and one could almost wish that she was better off dead. Interspersed with the prose are many asides in Lispector's own voice as an author. She apologizes to her readers that much of Macabea's story is actually her own and that she has to take breaks from creating these one dimensional characters because she has grown tired of them. Yet, the protagonist and author are one and the same- hailing from Recife, living in pain, fighting off eventual death. As a result I looked past the existentialism and stream of consciousness that I do not usually enjoy to find out if the end result for Macabea was death or the survival reminiscent of her namesake.
The Hour of the Star is my first forage into the greatest of Clarice Lispector. For a novella, this story had to be taken in chunks because it was tough to swallow all in one sitting. Knowing that this was published posthumously and written while Lispector was dying of cancer made me empathize all the more with her protagonist Macabea. Despite the writing style that I am usually not fond of, I found this story to hold my attention, if not for the sorrows befalling both the lead protagonist and author. I would be intrigued to read more of Lispector's earlier novels to get a further glimpse at her body of work, one that lead to her inclusion in an anthology of great books written by women.
3.75 stars
Lispector chooses to make Brazilian poverty, still a hot button issue today, as the focus of her last novel. In the opening pages, it is unclear who the novel's main protagonist is, but after an opening stream of consciousness monologue, we meet Macabea, who has come to Rio from Alagoas, close to Lispector's home state of Recife. While the Pinkhasovna family became Americanized almost immediately upon arrival in Brazil, Lispector consequently did not write about Jewish themes; however, as her own mortality loomed, she created a character in Macabea, who was both Jewish and autobiographical. Sharing my own family's Ukrainian origins, the I found the concept of a character based on the Macabees intriguing, and I was able to empathize with Macabea once I got past the surreal opening existential sequence.
Macabea was rejected from childhood. Her parents both passed away, and she was raised by an aunt who resembled an evil stepmother. She deprived Macabea of all joys in life, physically beating to the point of sterility. As soon as Macabea came of age in Alagoas, the aunt wanted to be rid of her and sent her packing to a cramped apartment in the red light slum district of Brazil. One could not help but feel for sorry for this protagonist: she was ugly yet did not realize it, a virgin, too poor to eat much more than Coca Cola and coffee without milk, and only got paid from her boss as an afterthought. Macabea evokes a mixture of Cinderella, an adult Cosette, and Eliza Doolittle before she was rescued from poverty. In a nutshell, Macabea is an ugly duckling of the world with no future as she lives in the slums of Rio, one of the world's most impoverished neighborhoods. It would take a miracle to save this young woman who unfortunately does not realize how horrendous her existence is.
Even the other characters in this novella view Macabea as beyond salvation. Olimpico comes from the same town in northeastern Brazil and befriends her not as a boyfriend, but because he feels sorry for her bleak life. Yet, Macabea is too dim to realize this and pins false hopes on their almost nonexistent relationship. Adding to sorrow is that Macabea naively introduces Olimpico to her sensuous co-worker Gloria and the two immediately become a couple. Each succeeding paragraph adds to Macabea's grief, and one could almost wish that she was better off dead. Interspersed with the prose are many asides in Lispector's own voice as an author. She apologizes to her readers that much of Macabea's story is actually her own and that she has to take breaks from creating these one dimensional characters because she has grown tired of them. Yet, the protagonist and author are one and the same- hailing from Recife, living in pain, fighting off eventual death. As a result I looked past the existentialism and stream of consciousness that I do not usually enjoy to find out if the end result for Macabea was death or the survival reminiscent of her namesake.
The Hour of the Star is my first forage into the greatest of Clarice Lispector. For a novella, this story had to be taken in chunks because it was tough to swallow all in one sitting. Knowing that this was published posthumously and written while Lispector was dying of cancer made me empathize all the more with her protagonist Macabea. Despite the writing style that I am usually not fond of, I found this story to hold my attention, if not for the sorrows befalling both the lead protagonist and author. I would be intrigued to read more of Lispector's earlier novels to get a further glimpse at her body of work, one that lead to her inclusion in an anthology of great books written by women.
3.75 stars
June 24, 2022
الرواية الأخيرة للكاتبة البرازيلية كلاريس ليسبكتور
نص صغير يثير التساؤلات عن الحياة, الوجود, طبيعة النفس الانسانية
يحكي الراوي الكاتب عن فتاة بسيطة وحياتها المهمشة
كغيرها من الشخصيات اللامرئية في الواقع الصاخب
تعيش الفقر والضعف والخذلان, لكن بدون أحزان ولا هموم
في عالم محدود لا يتسع ولا يتغير إلا بالوصول إلى النهاية
وخلال الحكي تتداخل شخصية الراوي الذي يقول
" ما دامت تلاحقني الأسئلة ولا أجد لها أجوبة, سأواصل الكتابة"..
سرد مختلف وترجمة سلسة عن البرتغالية لماجد الجبالي
نص صغير يثير التساؤلات عن الحياة, الوجود, طبيعة النفس الانسانية
يحكي الراوي الكاتب عن فتاة بسيطة وحياتها المهمشة
كغيرها من الشخصيات اللامرئية في الواقع الصاخب
تعيش الفقر والضعف والخذلان, لكن بدون أحزان ولا هموم
في عالم محدود لا يتسع ولا يتغير إلا بالوصول إلى النهاية
وخلال الحكي تتداخل شخصية الراوي الذي يقول
" ما دامت تلاحقني الأسئلة ولا أجد لها أجوبة, سأواصل الكتابة"..
سرد مختلف وترجمة سلسة عن البرتغالية لماجد الجبالي
August 11, 2020
Weird, charged, lyric little novella - very entertaining when it gets going and wonderfully surreal at the beginning, but the two sides don't quite match. Lispector is always surprising, always interesting.
May 23, 2017
"Every once in a while she wandered into the better neighborhoods and gazed at the shop windows glittering with jewels and satin clothes — just to mortify herself a bit. Because she needed to find herself and suffering a little is a way of finding."
One of these days, I'm going to put out a list of 100 most iconic book characters I have read and Macabea of this little book is going to be one of them. She is beautiful, she is healthy, she is confident, she is clever, she is witty, she is wealthy, she is wise ..... Okay, she is very opposite of all these things. She was a typist who was a terrible dresser, lived on only hot dogs and love coca cola.That is kind of people I like. Her poverty falls short only of her stupidity. But it is because of this stupidity, that she is happy - she doesn't understand how sad and miserable she is. In a world where people are defined those very qualities, she is lacking in, she is a non-entity but she doesn't know it, and that is what keeps her from sadness:
"If she was dumb enough to ask herself “who am I?” she would fall flat on her face. Because “who am I?” creates a need. And how can you satisfy that need? Those who wonder are incomplete."
A person so naive- but why? Why must she be so naive? I think some of us discover ourselves in solitude while others discover themselves among people. Macabea was, unfortunately, one of former group:
“She had a room all to herself. She could hardly believe that all this space was hers. And not a word was heard. So she danced in an act of absolute courage since her aunt couldn’t hear her. She danced and twirled because being alone made her: f-r-e-e!”
Unfortunately, because solitude is a luxury of rich, she lives in a slum in a room with women exactly like her. Solitude is a rare lottery, sadness is an unaffordable luxury:
"Sadness was the privilege of the rich, of those who could afford it, of those who had nothing better to do. Sadness was a luxury"
She even finds a boyfriend, a terrible person. The first time they meet it is raining. The second time they meet it is raining again.
"The third time they met — wouldn’t you know it was raining? — the guy, irritated and losing the light varnish of politeness that his stepfather had taught him with great effort, said:
— All you ever do is rain."
The whole story of full of such beautiful moments, even more beautiful writing and funny movements told with dramatic effect of small and big explosions. Frankly, she becomes so adorable by the end that I wish I was a few years older and she a real person, so that I could adopt her. I mean consider this passage:
"Speaking of novelties, the girl one day saw in a corner bar a man so, so, so good-looking that — that she wanted to have him at home. It would be, like — like having a big emerald-emerald-emerald in an open jewel box. Untouchable. From the ring she saw he was married. How to marry-marry-marry a being who was only to-to-to be seen, she stammered in her thoughts. She’d die of embarrassment to eat in front of him because he was good looking beyond any person’s possible balance."
I really don't know how this book doesn't make it to the lists of best books. Modernism, evocative, thought-provoking, beautiful prose, comic events, amazing character .... what else could you like?
But (explosion!) her story is not written by Lispector itself, it is written by another male character, an author:
"I am absolutely tired of literature; only muteness keeps me company. If I still write it’s because I have nothing better to do in the world while I wait for death."
Who intends to write her story in the traditional manner which is ironic because he is himself a part of the modern novel - a novel with several titles, and a novel that is also about the act of writing - how a story writes itself, and not only itself but it writes the author too - changing him irrevocably. He begins by deciding that he will stay indifferent to his character but:
"I have to say that the girl isn’t aware of me, if she was she’d have someone to pray to and that would mean salvation. But I’m fully aware of her: through this young person I scream my horror of life. Of this life I love so much."
Did CL too scream horrors of her life through Macabea? She does share Judaism and northeast childhood with her character and she too had worked as a typewriter while with the intermediary author she might have shared thoughts on literature and death (it was her last novel).
More quotes:
"she was happy but how it ached."
"She sat there leaning her head on her shoulder the way a dove gets sad."
"She believed in angels, and because she believed in them, they existed."
December 20, 2016
“Everything in the world began with a yes. One molecule said yes to another molecule and life was born.”
Thus opens the The Hour of the Star. Published just before Clarice Lispector’s death, reading it you could wonder if there is little of the intimate Lispector of Near to the Wild Heart. However, she betrays herself from the start. If in her first novel it was by its title, here we discover it in her opening lines. However, it goes much deeper than the mere allusion to Joyce. If here we find Lispector more secluded, she is not less truthful to herself.
The Hour of the Star is a story of abandonment that simultaneously offers solace. When you read the narrator Rodrigo’s words, that tell the brief and nostalgic tale of Macabéa, if you sense in Lispector last novel less of the author and more of the characters, that isn't quite true. Macabéa, a wretched woman who barely has conscience of her own existence, after losing her only link with the world, an old aunt, moves to Rio de Janeiro. There she rents a room, gets a job as typist and spends her hours listening to the radio. She falls in love with Olímpio de Jesus, a metal worker who soon betrays her. Desperate, Macabéa visits a fortune-teller who predicts a brilliant future for her, not what she expected at all.
Even creating a false author for the story, Lispector is not able to hide behind him. If in small shared past experiences or through concealed truths. So, small glimpses of the author's life emerge. And through Rodrigo's own wonderings, that tell so much and so little. Or through Macabéa herself. Lispector did indeed visit a fortune-teller when was growing up, as she tells in one of her pieces in her weely newspaper column (Included, I hope, in her great Selected Cronicas), where she also tried not to show too much of herself but ended doing just that. So, there is much of the author in The Hour of the Star. The desire to hide, which real death soon would consolidate, ultimately disappointed.
Despite the tragedy you will read about, the story is beautifully told.
"She believed in angels, and, because she believed, they existed.”.And like that, she writes on:
“So long as I have questions to which there are no answers, I shall go on writing.”
"I swear that this book is made up without words. It is a mute photography. This book is a silence. This book is a question.”(my own free translations from Portuguese.)
For all that, Clarice Lispector is one of my favorite Brazilian authors. I read her last novel many years ago, in Portuguese, and briefly revisited it now. Magnificent, simple and above all sublime!
Highly recommended!
July 7, 2020
This made me realise what a remarkable achievement Virginia Woolf's The Waves is because of how it sustains poetic inspiration from beginning to end. Not that this reminds me of The Waves; more it reminded me of the private glimpses she gave us of how she went about composing and structuring her book in her journal. Hour of the Star takes us into the mind of a writer in the act of composition. Lispector shares with us her inspirations along with her doubts. She includes in the narrative stray thoughts and observations that ostensibly have nothing to do with the story. But because this is a book about the act of creation nothing she includes in her narrative is irrelevant. There are some incredibly brilliant passages. There are also some which are less successful. The most baffling component of this novel though is its punctuation. There were times when I felt like I was reading a self-published novel which hadn't been near an editor. I learned in the afterword by the translator that her eccentric punctuation was wholly willed. "To rearrange conventional language". But, to be honest, it didn't have that effect on me. I often enjoy writers who take liberties with conventional punctuation - Toni Morrison immediately springs to mind - but I can't say this about Lispector. More, it seemed like she needed to take an evening class in grammar. 4+ stars.
June 28, 2022
Lately I find myself in the frustrating position (not uncommon among booksellers) of being surrounded by far more books than I can read. Not only are there books in the shop, but in my spare moments at work I browse Goodreads, Abebooks and my local library system, and so have a constant stream of books passing through my hands, many of which I can do no more than glance at before returning them or putting them away for later. Into this deluge has flowed this novella by Clarice Lispector, a book which I hear tell was scribbled on scraps of paper at intervals of months or years before coalescing into its current form, and which is - on one level - as evanescent and difficult to grasp as this technique suggests, even while being - on another - as direct as a bullet to the heart at ten paces. Imagine that famous Goya painting with the white shirt and the firing squad, but focus on the victim's face until you're so close the ridges in the paint are as important - as moving - as his expression. Ever read the Borges story 'The Secret Miracle'? When the raindrop which has hit Jaromir Hladik's face just as time stopped starts sliding again, that's maybe something like the little self-conscious 'explosions' with which Lispector riddles her narrative. Structurally, strip Beckett's Malone Dies to the bone - the fictional writer who tells the story as much the protagonist as s/he whose story he tells - and you've got a rough outline of The Hour of the Star. I say rough because either this is a book to read two or three times before knowing anything certain about it or my current white-water reading technique is just not up to the task. Whatever the case, this is a hard book to comprehend, coming as it does so directly from a place beyond comprehension, and I presume Lispector made a habit, like Beckett, of gazing intently on things beyond comprehension. Still, it's not a 'difficult' book - not on the level of language, anyway - and reports of the strangeness of its prose have, to my mind, been exaggerated. To me it reads quite naturally, especially in the new translation, and from what few pages I saw of the old translation I suggest forgetting that relic immediately and getting your hands on this one. It's modern, that's for damn sure - I doubt there is much else out there as sleek and arresting and asymmetrical as this. And it's haunting: Lispector speaks through her (male) narrator who speaks through his character Maccabea. I had just read (on the train to and from work, as perhaps readers of the Brazilian newspaper which published them might have read them) Lispector's Chronicas when I started the novella, and consequently had a vivid, if oblique, impression of her in mind as I read this. Unfortunately I don't have a copy of The Hour of the Star with me as I write, but perhaps these lines from one of her Chronicas ('Creating Brasilia') will help suggest the kind of writer she is or can be:
What kind of writer is Clarice Lispector? The rarest kind. The fact that her Chronicas ever made it into a newspaper at all - let alone week after week - is, to this Australian, astonishing. That The Hour of the Star is a bestseller and its author a household name in her own country is even moreso. Judging from what little I've read, Lispector's ruthless stripping away of everything but the visionary/intuitive/paradoxical is unmatched by any prose writer except Beckett, and when and if I ever have the time and resources to do so I will approach her ouevre as I once approached his: piece by piece, in a quiet room in the country with her biography close at hand.
This is a work so elemental it seems hewn from rock, or washed up on the shore in Brasilia from that non-existent sea. If I don't give it a perfect score it's only because I don't yet know if she speaks directly to my heart. But her example, her aesthetic determination, is unsurpassed.
Brasilia is built on the line of the horizon.
When I died, I opened my eyes one day and there was Brasilia.
The two architects who planned Brasilia were not interested in creating something beautiful. That would be too simple; they created their own terror, and left that terror unexplained.
Besides the wind, there is another thing that blows. It can only be recognised in the supernatural rippling of the lake. - Wherever you stand, you have the impression of being on the edge of a dangerous precipice.
Its founders tried to ignore the importance of human beings. The dimensions of the city's buildings were calculated for the heavens.
It is a shore without any sea.
How I should love to set white horses free here in Brasilia. At night, they would become green under the light of the moon - I know what those two men wanted: that slowness and silence which are also my idea of eternity.
Fear has always guided me to the things I love; and because I love, I become afraid.
What kind of writer is Clarice Lispector? The rarest kind. The fact that her Chronicas ever made it into a newspaper at all - let alone week after week - is, to this Australian, astonishing. That The Hour of the Star is a bestseller and its author a household name in her own country is even moreso. Judging from what little I've read, Lispector's ruthless stripping away of everything but the visionary/intuitive/paradoxical is unmatched by any prose writer except Beckett, and when and if I ever have the time and resources to do so I will approach her ouevre as I once approached his: piece by piece, in a quiet room in the country with her biography close at hand.
This is a work so elemental it seems hewn from rock, or washed up on the shore in Brasilia from that non-existent sea. If I don't give it a perfect score it's only because I don't yet know if she speaks directly to my heart. But her example, her aesthetic determination, is unsurpassed.
Clarice Lispector: this woman, our contemporary, a Brazilian woman… it is not books that she gives us, but the act of living saved by books, narratives, constructions that make us step back. And then, through her window-writing, we enter into the frightening beauty of learning how to read: and we pass, through the body, to the other side of the I. To love the truth of what is alive,... to love the origin, to be personally interested in the impersonal, in the animal, in the thing.
(Helene Cixious)
January 3, 2018
"I swear this book is made without words. It is a mute photograph. This book is a silence. This book is a question."
Benjamin Moser's translation of Clarice Lispector's final work is extraordinary. He preserves her unusual word order and her way of bringing new meaning to ordinary words, and the result is an absorbing work that brings the reader right up against existential questions of language and life, questions Lispector was confronting as she completed this novella shortly before her death.
One of the opening paragraphs serves as a manifesto of sorts, about the instability of life and time, the interplay between identity and words, and the impossibility of expressing truth in words:
"As long as I have questions and no answers I’ll keep on writing. How do you start at the beginning, if things happen before they happen? If before the pre-prehistory there were already the apocalyptic monsters? If this story doesn’t exist now, it will. Thinking is an act. Feeling is a fact. Put the two together — I am the one writing what I am writing. God is the world. Truth is always an interior and inexplicable contact. My truest life is unrecognizable, extremely interior and there is not a single word that defines it. My heart has emptied itself of every desire and been reduced to its own final or primary beat."
One the most basic level, this is a story, told by a male narrator, of the circumscribed, impoverished life of Macabéa, a young woman from northeastern Brazil who moves to Rio. She eats little, understands little, experiences little, questions little. Her story is one of loss; in telling it, Lispector confronts her reader with the omnipresence and limitations of our creation of ourselves, of the limitations and instability of language and experience in our self-definition and self-understanding. In exploring this theme, Lispector destabilizes language itself -- referring to someone not noticed by others as "cold coffee," summing up the cycle of life and death as "a thin slice of watermelon." In the book's beginning, the narrator's lyrical language confronts words' limitations by transcending them:
"I am not an intellectual, I write with my body. And what I write is a moist fog. Words are sounds transfused with unequal shadows that intersect, stalactites, lace, transfigured organ music. I hardly dare shout out words at this vibrant and rich, morbid and dark web which has its countertone in the thick bass of pain. Allegro con brio. I’ll try to wrest gold from charcoal."
In the end, language and life are both ephemeral.
Benjamin Moser's translation of Clarice Lispector's final work is extraordinary. He preserves her unusual word order and her way of bringing new meaning to ordinary words, and the result is an absorbing work that brings the reader right up against existential questions of language and life, questions Lispector was confronting as she completed this novella shortly before her death.
One of the opening paragraphs serves as a manifesto of sorts, about the instability of life and time, the interplay between identity and words, and the impossibility of expressing truth in words:
"As long as I have questions and no answers I’ll keep on writing. How do you start at the beginning, if things happen before they happen? If before the pre-prehistory there were already the apocalyptic monsters? If this story doesn’t exist now, it will. Thinking is an act. Feeling is a fact. Put the two together — I am the one writing what I am writing. God is the world. Truth is always an interior and inexplicable contact. My truest life is unrecognizable, extremely interior and there is not a single word that defines it. My heart has emptied itself of every desire and been reduced to its own final or primary beat."
One the most basic level, this is a story, told by a male narrator, of the circumscribed, impoverished life of Macabéa, a young woman from northeastern Brazil who moves to Rio. She eats little, understands little, experiences little, questions little. Her story is one of loss; in telling it, Lispector confronts her reader with the omnipresence and limitations of our creation of ourselves, of the limitations and instability of language and experience in our self-definition and self-understanding. In exploring this theme, Lispector destabilizes language itself -- referring to someone not noticed by others as "cold coffee," summing up the cycle of life and death as "a thin slice of watermelon." In the book's beginning, the narrator's lyrical language confronts words' limitations by transcending them:
"I am not an intellectual, I write with my body. And what I write is a moist fog. Words are sounds transfused with unequal shadows that intersect, stalactites, lace, transfigured organ music. I hardly dare shout out words at this vibrant and rich, morbid and dark web which has its countertone in the thick bass of pain. Allegro con brio. I’ll try to wrest gold from charcoal."
In the end, language and life are both ephemeral.
Want to read
March 12, 2024entering my clarice lispector era
March 23, 2014
A deceptively short novella with a minimal story which has an underlying philosophical intensity that belies the simple plot. It is the story of Macabea narrated by the rather mysterious Rodrigo SM; he plays a slightly ambiguous role in the story; his asides are amusing and he appears sympathetic. However I suspect he is a rather unreliable and deliberately male narrator.
Macabea has moved to Rio from Northern Brazil and is now alone in the world; strictly brought up by her aunt she is portrayed as one of life’s casualties who is of little consequence. She is poor and lives in a slum sharing a small flat with work colleagues. Rodrigo describes her as undernourished, ugly (with great frequency), dirty, naive, innocent, unfeeling; wretched. Macabea is free in that she doesn’t seem to know how unhappy she is. She briefly has a boyfriend, who treats her cruelly and then leaves her for her friend who has more traditional female charms (according to Rodrigo).
The fortune teller at the end of the book tells Macabea she is about to have a wondrous change of fortune; she gets run over by a Mercedes and dies on the street, at last the centre of attention. That’s not a spoiler; Rodrigo tells you what is going to happen early on in the book and maintains an air of smugness with his sympathy throughout.
This is the first Lispector I have read, and she has a unique style; the prose works well and she creates almost a fairy tale like atmosphere. There are a couple of neat literary devices which link to events and actions and the events of the novel are simple but underlaid with thoughts and reflections on philosophy and writing. It is haunting and I am sure there is a good deal of Lispector in it; a definite city vs country feel; a reflection on the absolute grinding nature of poverty, the problem of identity and how to write about it.
I would also tend to agree with those who see this as something of a feminist manifesto. The principal male character, the boyfriend Olimpico, is totally self obsessed and women in his life are extensions of himself. Then there is Rodrigo; he is the one who narrates Macabea’s story and gives us all the information about her. How do we know about her unloveliness and ugliness; Rodrigo tells us. All of our judgements about her come from him; this, Lispector is telling us, is how men judge and value women. It is men who decide what beauty and ugliness is. Macabea’s values and real character are woven into the thread of the narrative, despite the narrator and we are left to judge if she is really ugly and worthless and we are left to think on the injustice of her life.
It really is very well constructed and complex and worth reading.
Macabea has moved to Rio from Northern Brazil and is now alone in the world; strictly brought up by her aunt she is portrayed as one of life’s casualties who is of little consequence. She is poor and lives in a slum sharing a small flat with work colleagues. Rodrigo describes her as undernourished, ugly (with great frequency), dirty, naive, innocent, unfeeling; wretched. Macabea is free in that she doesn’t seem to know how unhappy she is. She briefly has a boyfriend, who treats her cruelly and then leaves her for her friend who has more traditional female charms (according to Rodrigo).
The fortune teller at the end of the book tells Macabea she is about to have a wondrous change of fortune; she gets run over by a Mercedes and dies on the street, at last the centre of attention. That’s not a spoiler; Rodrigo tells you what is going to happen early on in the book and maintains an air of smugness with his sympathy throughout.
This is the first Lispector I have read, and she has a unique style; the prose works well and she creates almost a fairy tale like atmosphere. There are a couple of neat literary devices which link to events and actions and the events of the novel are simple but underlaid with thoughts and reflections on philosophy and writing. It is haunting and I am sure there is a good deal of Lispector in it; a definite city vs country feel; a reflection on the absolute grinding nature of poverty, the problem of identity and how to write about it.
I would also tend to agree with those who see this as something of a feminist manifesto. The principal male character, the boyfriend Olimpico, is totally self obsessed and women in his life are extensions of himself. Then there is Rodrigo; he is the one who narrates Macabea’s story and gives us all the information about her. How do we know about her unloveliness and ugliness; Rodrigo tells us. All of our judgements about her come from him; this, Lispector is telling us, is how men judge and value women. It is men who decide what beauty and ugliness is. Macabea’s values and real character are woven into the thread of the narrative, despite the narrator and we are left to judge if she is really ugly and worthless and we are left to think on the injustice of her life.
It really is very well constructed and complex and worth reading.
March 15, 2023
This is a very unique style of writing and I have to say I preferred parts of it to the whole. However I was fascinated by it and it’s short length allowed me to not get annoyed with the unorthodoxy while reading it.
‘Who has not asked himself at some time or other: am I a monster or is this what it means to be a person
‘Who has not asked himself at some time or other: am I a monster or is this what it means to be a person
April 20, 2020
A strange novella about the life of a meager girl, The Hour of the Star reflects on life, love, and, above all else, storytelling itself. The short work takes place in the slums of Rio, and follows the working-class typist Macabéa as she fruitlessly searches for fame and romance; a mean-spirited and absurd twist ends the plot on a note of violence. The novella is told from the perspective of an affluent but spiritually void old man, a distant observer who spends the first third of the book questioning what it means to tell a story and justifying his interest in Macabéa as a subject. It unfolds in a series of oddly structured sentences, full of memorable but off-putting images. I’ll plan to revisit Lispector’s work after some time has passed, but for now her style is too abstract for my tastes.
August 25, 2023
Published two months before the death of its author, this upside-down fairy tale, at the same time that it registers Macabéa's weak life, composing an exterior, explicit narrative that also questions are ironic and exposes the perplexities of contemporary fiction. Through an author-narrator, Rodrigo SM intends to capture the feeling of perdition of the face of a Northeastern woman seen at random on the street in Rio de Janeiro. This primary life breathes, breathes, breathes.
Tormented by the character that he created but that he does not know completely, the narrator collides, at every moment, with the differences of social class and gender and, particularly, in the possibilities and limitations of language, in the agony of the act of writing and in the word he establishes, reveals and hides.
Tormented by the character that he created but that he does not know completely, the narrator collides, at every moment, with the differences of social class and gender and, particularly, in the possibilities and limitations of language, in the agony of the act of writing and in the word he establishes, reveals and hides.
March 2, 2020
“A hora da estrela” foi um daqueles livros que comecei a ler com uma expectativa alta – o que costuma ser arriscado – e que, ao final, se superou. É, antes de mais nada, uma obra que transborda humanidade. O enredo é simples: Macabéa é uma jovem nascida em Alagoas, órfã, pobre e que se muda para a cidade grande para trabalhar como datilógrafa. Logo no início, Rodrigo SM, o narrador e alter-ego da própria Clarice, já afirma não “ser complexo o que escreverei”. Mas apesar de uma história simples, a autora constrói uma riquíssima, cheia de reflexões.
Já a personagem é mesmo simples, não só no sentido material, por ser pobre, mas também como ser humano. Macabéa é pura, ingênua, sem grandes ambições. Macabéa almeja apenas ser feliz, ainda que não saiba muito bem em que consista a felicidade. E é por meio dessa obra que Clarice – ou melhor, Rodrigo SM – dá voz ao cidadão “comum”. Dá o direito ao grito às “milhares de moças espalhadas pelos crotiçoes, vagas de cama num quarto, atrás de balcões trabalhando até a estafa”. A escrita de Clarice é muito impactante, sendo, na minha opinião, uma das características responsáveis por elevar essa obra à categoria dos grandes clássicos da literatura nacional – e, até mesmo, mundial. É uma obra carregada de metalinguagem, isto é, o narrador se vale do próprio livro para explicar e refletir com o leitor sobre a tarefa de escrever uma história. Com esse método, Clarice consegue aproximar o leitor da narrativa e, por consequência, da vida de Macabéa. No início, a extrema ingenuidade da personagem pode despertar um certo incomodo em quem lê a obra. Mas essa sensação é logo substituída por uma compaixão, criando um forte laço entre o leitor e Macabéa. Na minha opinião, é uma leitura obrigatória!
Também recomendo muito essa edição que comprei da @editorarocco, com reproduções do manuscrito original e textos de apoio que enriquecem ainda mais a leitura.
“O que escrevo é mais do que invenção, é minha obrigação contar sobre essa moça entre milhares delas. E dever meu, nem que seja de pouca arte, o de revelar-lhe a vida. Porque há o direito ao grito. Então eu grito.”
Nota: 10/10
Mais resenhas em: https://www.instagram.com/book.ster/
Já a personagem é mesmo simples, não só no sentido material, por ser pobre, mas também como ser humano. Macabéa é pura, ingênua, sem grandes ambições. Macabéa almeja apenas ser feliz, ainda que não saiba muito bem em que consista a felicidade. E é por meio dessa obra que Clarice – ou melhor, Rodrigo SM – dá voz ao cidadão “comum”. Dá o direito ao grito às “milhares de moças espalhadas pelos crotiçoes, vagas de cama num quarto, atrás de balcões trabalhando até a estafa”. A escrita de Clarice é muito impactante, sendo, na minha opinião, uma das características responsáveis por elevar essa obra à categoria dos grandes clássicos da literatura nacional – e, até mesmo, mundial. É uma obra carregada de metalinguagem, isto é, o narrador se vale do próprio livro para explicar e refletir com o leitor sobre a tarefa de escrever uma história. Com esse método, Clarice consegue aproximar o leitor da narrativa e, por consequência, da vida de Macabéa. No início, a extrema ingenuidade da personagem pode despertar um certo incomodo em quem lê a obra. Mas essa sensação é logo substituída por uma compaixão, criando um forte laço entre o leitor e Macabéa. Na minha opinião, é uma leitura obrigatória!
Também recomendo muito essa edição que comprei da @editorarocco, com reproduções do manuscrito original e textos de apoio que enriquecem ainda mais a leitura.
“O que escrevo é mais do que invenção, é minha obrigação contar sobre essa moça entre milhares delas. E dever meu, nem que seja de pouca arte, o de revelar-lhe a vida. Porque há o direito ao grito. Então eu grito.”
Nota: 10/10
Mais resenhas em: https://www.instagram.com/book.ster/
January 2, 2016
Interstellar Heap of Dust
Sim.
This is how Clarice Lispector chose to finish her book: with the same word as Joyce did. His famous Yes. But she began with it too. For as she says in her opening line, everything in the world began with a Yes.
And so she unfolds her story. Or lets her male narrator unfold it. Several barriers are thus created between her and us and her story – his story. And the Hour of the Star, not one of those in heaven, but the Star as a celebrity, is the title for the story of someone who is as notorious as a speck of dust.
The banality of the fable is not matched by the sophistication of the novella. This short fiction reads like an astute laboratory on writing. Defending simplicity of language and reminding that the basic element of writing is the word, Lispector’s narrator recognizes that writing is an effort in self-knowledge. This is what we then ask. What did she find when building the writing self--when she is writing about another. An object.
The speck of dust is a woman who does not acquire her name, Macabéa, for several pages. She first is a lassie from the northeast, a nordestina. She was first also a girl with no name. For the first year in her life she was not named, and she preferred to remain unnamed to being incorrectly named and wrongly identified. Ah, identities forged by words.
May be that is why words are tiring and Lispector’s narrator, afraid of words and literature, seeks silence since writing is a way of whiling away one’s life until the end arrives.
And so it does for Macabéa: her celebrity moment, her hora da estrela.
The final affirmative however does not close the narration. It waits for an answer.
As open and loose as interstellar dust.
Read
May 3, 2019Oh muse, aid me, by God's toe and the bones of saints' uncounted.
The problem with reviewing this book, is this book, but that is narrow minded of me, sorry, a problem with reviewing this book, is this book, another problem with reviewing this book, is reviewing. Perhaps there are further valid difficulties to list, I would not like to deny that possibility.
So I could say it is unique, but I haven't read all the books that ever there were so that could be lying, it is offbeat and weird but not so off beat or that weird, I could say it is unconventional but then when I tell you that the story, such as it is, is girl meets boy, boy is distracted by the riper charms of a plumper girl who also was born and bred in the capital , girl is left alone and experiences the conclusion of the story, you will see that I barely understand the first thing about language, literature, stories, culture or the typical habits of human persons.
If we strained the published book and in the colander or sieve or cheesecloth, and caught only the story and lost the story telling then we would be looking at maybe twelve pages rather than the seventy-seven printed ones in which a narrator who is not the author tells us about the nature of the characters and in a hagiographic humility topos tells us how inadequate he is as a narrator - look I am trying to do the same thing, which shows the awful power of the author Clarice Lispector even though she is not only dead but in Brazil and as is well known running water insulates the harassed vulnerable person from all kinds of witches, demons, and foreign authors if not from from micro plastics or the perils of world trade - neither of which feature in this novel except as objects of wonder and delight.
So what can I say? I don't know, what can I say? It is and is not a picaresque story, perhaps if you looked only at the boy, you might reshape it as a picaresque story set in 20th century Brazil. We're certainly down at that kind of level, a demi-monde of criminals, the potential criminal, the criminally undereducated and abused, with a singular swagger to the narration. It might be a hagiography, a political and social protest story, an explosion of words about gender and identity. But maybe it is all in the eye of the beholder, I don't know any more and I didn't know any way even as I read it.
The fates, if you pardon me, arse about. And as a result of this I am required to be obliged to travel, however as apparently I have free will, or don't, I invariably take a book or two with me . On a previous iteration of this journey I travelled with The Blue Fox, I read it once on the outward journey and again on the return, this time with Hour of the Star and I didn't even read it once, but the journey was no longer, however I may have been distracted by the newspaper, which contained no news that I wanted to read, despite being the only witness I am unwilling to comment further on this irrelevant non-event. But I can say that The Blue Fox is worth reading. Hour of the Star is somehow beyond recommendation. Before handing over to her narrator, Clarice, that sweet heart, that Lispector, dedicates her tale to: Robert and Clara Schumann, Beethoven, Bach, Chopin, Stravinsky, Richard Strauss, Debussy, Marlos Nobre, Prokofiev, Carl Orff, Schoenberg, the twelve-tone composers, and to the electronic composers. Now I don't know a thing about Marlos Nobre, but reading through these seventy-seven pages I could hear the resonances of all the others. If that doesn't make any kind of sense to you then you have to read it for yourself, and if you can already taste it on your tongue, then you'll want to read it for yourself. And that's it. Vivat Clarice .
The problem with reviewing this book, is this book, but that is narrow minded of me, sorry, a problem with reviewing this book, is this book, another problem with reviewing this book, is reviewing. Perhaps there are further valid difficulties to list, I would not like to deny that possibility.
So I could say it is unique, but I haven't read all the books that ever there were so that could be lying, it is offbeat and weird but not so off beat or that weird, I could say it is unconventional but then when I tell you that the story, such as it is, is girl meets boy, boy is distracted by the riper charms of a plumper girl who also was born and bred in the capital , girl is left alone and experiences the conclusion of the story, you will see that I barely understand the first thing about language, literature, stories, culture or the typical habits of human persons.
If we strained the published book and in the colander or sieve or cheesecloth, and caught only the story and lost the story telling then we would be looking at maybe twelve pages rather than the seventy-seven printed ones in which a narrator who is not the author tells us about the nature of the characters and in a hagiographic humility topos tells us how inadequate he is as a narrator - look I am trying to do the same thing, which shows the awful power of the author Clarice Lispector even though she is not only dead but in Brazil and as is well known running water insulates the harassed vulnerable person from all kinds of witches, demons, and foreign authors if not from from micro plastics or the perils of world trade - neither of which feature in this novel except as objects of wonder and delight.
So what can I say? I don't know, what can I say? It is and is not a picaresque story, perhaps if you looked only at the boy, you might reshape it as a picaresque story set in 20th century Brazil. We're certainly down at that kind of level, a demi-monde of criminals, the potential criminal, the criminally undereducated and abused, with a singular swagger to the narration. It might be a hagiography, a political and social protest story, an explosion of words about gender and identity. But maybe it is all in the eye of the beholder, I don't know any more and I didn't know any way even as I read it.
The fates, if you pardon me, arse about. And as a result of this I am required to be obliged to travel, however as apparently I have free will, or don't, I invariably take a book or two with me . On a previous iteration of this journey I travelled with The Blue Fox, I read it once on the outward journey and again on the return, this time with Hour of the Star and I didn't even read it once, but the journey was no longer, however I may have been distracted by the newspaper, which contained no news that I wanted to read, despite being the only witness I am unwilling to comment further on this irrelevant non-event. But I can say that The Blue Fox is worth reading. Hour of the Star is somehow beyond recommendation. Before handing over to her narrator, Clarice, that sweet heart, that Lispector, dedicates her tale to: Robert and Clara Schumann, Beethoven, Bach, Chopin, Stravinsky, Richard Strauss, Debussy, Marlos Nobre, Prokofiev, Carl Orff, Schoenberg, the twelve-tone composers, and to the electronic composers. Now I don't know a thing about Marlos Nobre, but reading through these seventy-seven pages I could hear the resonances of all the others. If that doesn't make any kind of sense to you then you have to read it for yourself, and if you can already taste it on your tongue, then you'll want to read it for yourself. And that's it. Vivat Clarice .
October 10, 2022
هناك وهنا وفي المدن كلها والقرى والوديان والبحار والصحاري والذاكرة بسعتها الشاسعة التي تجذب العالم كشبكة عنكبوت ستقلّدها التكنولوجيا ولن تقيّدها، ستجد تلك الشخصية التي أحضرتها إليك كلاريس ليسبكتور (1920- 1977م) من حاراة برازيلية ضيقة، شخصية مأساوية لا تدري ما المأساة، ربما تثير سخرية الآخرين ولاتدري ما في تلك الضحكات البلهاء من سوداوية، تستمع إلى الإذاعة ولا تدري ما جدوى ما تحشره في نفسها تلك المعلومات المشتتة، في الحقيقة كلاريسا لم تستطع أن تصاحبها فمتابعتها نقطة ألم تتسع لتصبح محيطا في النفس يبتلع كل فرحة زائفة أو أمل عارض، تترك كلاريس مهمة إحضارها لشخصية مؤلف يبحث عن قصة، كصيّاد التقط سمكة من نهر الحياة وما عليه سوى أن يقلبها على وهج الحكي، المؤلف الداخلي مسكين أيضا فهو يتألم من أجل فتاته التي ليست سوى أحد المعاني الصريحة المطروحة في الطريق، كيف يصنع منها دراما؟ سيطول حديث المؤلف الشبح عن ماهية الفن الروائي ، ربما يضجرك قليلا لكنه مهم للنقّاد الذين يلهثون خلف سيميائيات الحداثة في الآداب المحلية والمقارنة والعالمية، وحينما يكون القص الشارح، أو ماوراء السرد، موضوعا روائيا سيسعد الباحث كثيرا لأنه وجد الحداثة في حياة كالموت وموت رحيم بالحياة، مثلما سيسعد بتحليل العنوان الذي يقيم مفارقة مع المحتوى، فساعة النجمة هي لحظة نهاية من لم تمسهم نشوة الحياة أبدا
لماذا اخترعت المؤلفة كلاريس ليسبيكتور شخصية المؤلف الداخلي لكي لا يتصور القارئ أنها الراوية؟ هل لقسوة الموضوع فقط؟ أظن أن السبب الجوهري هو الفكرة نفسها، فالمؤلف الداخلي الذي يقوم بدور الراوي، لا يأتي بشخصيته المأساوية من شوارع المدينة لتكون حالة معينة محددة ضعيفة منهارة مخدوعة واهمة، أو إحدى الشخصيات التي تمثل طبقة أو تشير إلى نوعية من الناس؟ لا إنها معادل التجربة البشرية، لذلك فهي تكاد تكون صورة عميقة من المؤلفة ذاتها، المؤلفة في أزمتها الوجودية المعرفية التي يداريها الوجود الاجتماعي بقشرته البراقة الهشة، ومعظمنا يدرك كم تداري الأقنعة ضعفا نخفيه في خزانتنا شبه الفارغة
رواية لن تنساها، ولن تنسى شخصيتها المحورية، ولن تنسى الأديبة البرازيلية كلاريس ليسبكتورالتي ماتت قبيل فجر يوم ميلادها السابع والخمسين، وستشكر ماجد الجبالي المترجم الذي تحمل عبء نقل نص يلقي بصيص ضوء على عذاب البشرية
لماذا اخترعت المؤلفة كلاريس ليسبيكتور شخصية المؤلف الداخلي لكي لا يتصور القارئ أنها الراوية؟ هل لقسوة الموضوع فقط؟ أظن أن السبب الجوهري هو الفكرة نفسها، فالمؤلف الداخلي الذي يقوم بدور الراوي، لا يأتي بشخصيته المأساوية من شوارع المدينة لتكون حالة معينة محددة ضعيفة منهارة مخدوعة واهمة، أو إحدى الشخصيات التي تمثل طبقة أو تشير إلى نوعية من الناس؟ لا إنها معادل التجربة البشرية، لذلك فهي تكاد تكون صورة عميقة من المؤلفة ذاتها، المؤلفة في أزمتها الوجودية المعرفية التي يداريها الوجود الاجتماعي بقشرته البراقة الهشة، ومعظمنا يدرك كم تداري الأقنعة ضعفا نخفيه في خزانتنا شبه الفارغة
رواية لن تنساها، ولن تنسى شخصيتها المحورية، ولن تنسى الأديبة البرازيلية كلاريس ليسبكتورالتي ماتت قبيل فجر يوم ميلادها السابع والخمسين، وستشكر ماجد الجبالي المترجم الذي تحمل عبء نقل نص يلقي بصيص ضوء على عذاب البشرية
February 26, 2016
Sigue mi romance con Clarice, que lleva años y es cada vez mejor. Este es el último libro que publicó en vida, salió, y a los pocos meses murió.
Una historia triste, que no sabes si la escribe por una crítica social, o si al describir a un personaje tan desvalido, sola, flaca, "con los ovarios marchitos", que no es consciente de su vida tan desesperada, que no sabe que es infeliz, quizás está hablando de otra cosa, de una tristeza, o algo más profundo.
El narrador es duro, y está intentando hablar solo con acción, como si respondiera a la forma en como siempre habló clarice, mirando hacia adentro.
"Está claro que, como todo escritor, estoy tentado a usar términos suculentos: conozco adjetivos esplendorosos, carnosos sustantivos y verbos tan elegantes que atraviesan agudos el aire en busca de acción..."
Precioso y duro, no sé por qué tarde tanto en llegar a este libro.
Una historia triste, que no sabes si la escribe por una crítica social, o si al describir a un personaje tan desvalido, sola, flaca, "con los ovarios marchitos", que no es consciente de su vida tan desesperada, que no sabe que es infeliz, quizás está hablando de otra cosa, de una tristeza, o algo más profundo.
El narrador es duro, y está intentando hablar solo con acción, como si respondiera a la forma en como siempre habló clarice, mirando hacia adentro.
"Está claro que, como todo escritor, estoy tentado a usar términos suculentos: conozco adjetivos esplendorosos, carnosos sustantivos y verbos tan elegantes que atraviesan agudos el aire en busca de acción..."
Precioso y duro, no sé por qué tarde tanto en llegar a este libro.
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