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The Hour of the Star

by Clarice Lispector, Giovanni Pontiero (Translator)

3.94 of 5 stars 3.94 · rating details · 2,852 ratings · 209 reviews

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 and eking out a poor living as a typist, Macabéa loves movies, Coca-Cola, and her rat of a boyfriend; she would like t...more

Paperback, 96 pages

Published February 17th 1992 by New Directions (first published 1977)

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Aug 20, 2012 Ben Winch rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: latin-american, brazilian

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...more 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:

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 ouvre 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)

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Nov 24, 2012 knig rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2012, quirky

Someone is walking on my grave.

Lispector is MJ Nicholl’s doppelganger. I’m sure he hasn’t heard of her, which makes the similarities of exactness between aPostmodern Belch and The Hour eerie. Not only do we have the narrator fooling around with three characters (Macabea, Gloria and Olympico) who are clearly facets of herself, but on page 57 we even have ‘quiddidity’ apropos Macabaea: need I say more?

Its no secret Macabea is a ‘loser’, an anti-heroine, an anonymous nonentity, wretched, ugly, sic...more
Someone is walking on my grave.

Lispector is MJ Nicholl’s doppelganger. I’m sure he hasn’t heard of her, which makes the similarities of exactness between aPostmodern Belch and The Hour eerie. Not only do we have the narrator fooling around with three characters (Macabea, Gloria and Olympico) who are clearly facets of herself, but on page 57 we even have ‘quiddidity’ apropos Macabaea: need I say more?

Its no secret Macabea is a ‘loser’, an anti-heroine, an anonymous nonentity, wretched, ugly, sick and unfortunate. It says so on the back cover. Even her name alludes it: in Spanish it mean ‘whipped’ or ‘henpecked’. Obviously Lispector, being Brazilian, writes in Portuguese, but I’d still go with that interpretation rather than the accepted dogma that she was referring to ‘Macabees’, an Aramaic/Jewish male name, in a nod to her own Jewish/Ukrainian heritage. Frankly, the woman seems to have made her religious choice and its pretty obvious she’s gone down the well trodden Catholic path: not atypical for Latin America, where, if this is even possible, there is an even bigger, wider bibel belt than in the US.

Macabea is clearly a projection of Lispector’ own unwanted qualities, alongside Gloria and Olympico. This three faceted representation fascinates: first, the names; Gloria and Olympico, as the names signify, are representative of the societal view of success; they are shallow, dull, supercilious and spiritually bereft, albeit it physically fit specimens. Ergo the homecoming queen and king are arrived. Macabea, who is meant to be the downtrodden one, seems to be possessed of more dignity, inquisitiveness and desire to ‘be’ than the other two put together. Why this troika though? Why does Lispector (and MJ!) feel this need to extrapolate in threes? Three of course is a mystical number: perhaps one of the most important numbers in the western hemisphere: in as much as the holy trinity is the manifestation of the essence of God, so perhaps we seek, on the basis of such cultural hegemony, to find our own meaning through trebling: remember, ‘things happen in threes’! the three muses, the three witches in Mcbeth, the three little pigs, three wishes, ........fill your own blank.

Macabea isn’t just a repository for unwanted qualities, though: besides being a sin eater she’s also a redeemer as well. Everything Lispector wants to be, but can’t be is dichotomously coupled with everything she is which she doesn’t want to be. Because Macabea is wretched, but she also has the ability to be happy, to find grace in her misfortune, and if no one notices her, its because she’s ‘supersonic’ rather than invisible (p62).

Of course as Lispector interfaces with Macabea via a males narrator in a sort of Second Life endeavour, her exotic Frankensteinian creation assumes its own independence, and emphatically keeps getting away from its narrator. What this means is that Lispector is getting further and further away from being able to reconcile the dual antithesis of her nature: its clear the only solution is going to be to terminate the experiment, and subsume Macabea within her in order to be ‘whole’ again.

And so: what a termination scene Lispector delivers. As Macabea lays dying, the title of the novel yields its secret: the star here refers not to a celestial but rather a Hollywoodian being. Macabea’s moment of death, surrounded by gawking spectators as she lies bloodied on a street corner, is her first and last time in the limelight: the girl everyone has ignored during her whole life has this one shot at leaving a footprint: her moment, or her hour has come. And frankly, thats not the only thing thats come. Because I think Macabea comes as well, for the first and of course last time: her entire death sequence is one protracted sensual segue, a lusty embrace of life and orgasmic joy. Its poignant really that she passes on in the throes of an orgasm.

Lispector moans a little afterwards: ‘Macabea’s murdered me’, she laments. I think not. Macabea saves her. Spiritually, mentally, even sexually. For goodness sake, what does Listepector do in closing: light a cigarette! And go home, cause its strawberry season. What do I do? Think about my favourite cigarette joke: you know: the chicken and the egg are lying in bed. The chicken is smoking a cigarette with a satisfied smile on its face and the egg is frowning and looking a bit pissed off. The egg mutters, to no-one in particular, "Well, I guess we answered THAT question!"

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Nov 29, 2011 Chad Post rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It goes without saying that this is an incredible, incredible novella. Narrated by the self-involved Rodrigo S.M., he tells the story of Macabea, a pathetic, ugly, sad, unfortunate, unloved woman from the northeast part of Brazil who moves to Rio. Rodrigo's descriptions--and various asides--are by turns cutting and quite funny, and occasionally display his peculiar love for the character of Macabea. On all levels, this is an unforgettable book--one worth reading over and again.

In terms of the ne...more It goes without saying that this is an incredible, incredible novella. Narrated by the self-involved Rodrigo S.M., he tells the story of Macabea, a pathetic, ugly, sad, unfortunate, unloved woman from the northeast part of Brazil who moves to Rio. Rodrigo's descriptions--and various asides--are by turns cutting and quite funny, and occasionally display his peculiar love for the character of Macabea. On all levels, this is an unforgettable book--one worth reading over and again.

In terms of the new translation, it took me a little while to get used to the quirkiness of what Ben was up to. Punctuation is screwy, commas are missing, em-dashes are begged for, phrases become sentences, and unique word choices abound. By the end though, I had totally bought into what he was up to--a belief that was totally reconfirmed in his very enlightening afterword, which includes this raging quote from Lispector about the translation of her first novel into French:

"I admit, if you like, that the sentences do not reflect the usual manner of speaking, but I assure you that it is the same in Portuguese," she writes. "The punctuation I employed in the book is not accidental and does not result from an ignorance of the rules of grammar. You will agree that the elementary principles of punctuation are taught in every school. I am fully aware of the reasons that led me to choose this punctuation and insist that it be respected."

And in response to the comment that most translators tended to "pluck the spines from the cactus" so to speak, Ben has this to say:

"The tendency is understandable. It may even, to some extent, be inevitable. Clarice Lispector's weird word choices, strange syntax, and lack of interest in conventional grammar produces sentences--often fragments of sentences--that veer toward abstraction without ever quite reaching it. Her goal, mystical as well as artistic, was to rearrange conventional language to find meaning, but never to discard it completely.

"Paradoxically, the better one's Portuguese, the more difficult it is to read Clarice Lispector."

One could argue that this translation retains the "foreignness" of Lispector's prose, constantly bringing that oddness to the reader's attention, but in my opinion, that's bullshit. This is a book crafted by a real writer, someone who defied the conventional "rules" that litter and clog hundred of MFA programs and tens of thousands of fourth-rate novels lining bookstores' shelves to create something new, unique, and beautiful, and reading a book like this reconfirms some of the wonderful possibilities found in fiction. (less)

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Oct 20, 2007 Meghan rated it 5 of 5 stars

Lispector is one of those novelist who can write about writing, and do so before you even understand what you're reading. In this novel, she personifies the conceptual "spark of inspiration" into a strange, endearing woman, then proceeds to describe her obsessively from the point of a male author/narrator. What unfolds is that rare balance of metaphoric manifesto on writing and an engrossing narrative. Her writing is stunning, almost surreal, and this little novella has more to teach about writi...more

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Dec 05, 2011 jeremy rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: translation, fiction

not having read the giovanni pontiero (saramago's longtime english translator) translation of the hour of the star, i am unable to compare the original translation with benjamin moser's new one, yet his afterword in this newly retranslated edition seems to make clear that lispector's seemingly unconventional use of punctuation and grammar was entirely intentional. much has been made about the difficult task a translator confronts when rendering a book from its native language, and perhaps nowher...more not having read the giovanni pontiero (saramago's longtime english translator) translation of the hour of the star, i am unable to compare the original translation with benjamin moser's new one, yet his afterword in this newly retranslated edition seems to make clear that lispector's seemingly unconventional use of punctuation and grammar was entirely intentional. much has been made about the difficult task a translator confronts when rendering a book from its native language, and perhaps nowhere is that arduous endeavor more apparent than in clarice lispector's 1977 novella. as the author of an acclaimed biography on lispector, why this world, it seems moser was well-suited to take on retranslation duties and see that the hour of the star was restored to a more faithful rendition.

the hour of the star is most certainly a book that would reward one with subsequent readings. lispector's prose frequently shimmers with an innocent beauty, as there are passages that simply radiate. the story itself is dually constructed; offering the tale of its main character, macabéa, a poor, unattractive, malnourished, yet curious (if naïve) rio-based typist, as well as that of the work's narrator, rodrigo s.m., and his mounting hardships in conveying the tale of young macabéa. while the hour of the star is often a woeful story, the sheer ingenuity of lispector's storytelling skill is quite remarkable. there is not much action to speak of, yet somehow lispector pulls off the feat of making readers care about both her subject and the narrator, despite soliciting pity for them both. the hour of the star is an exquisite and singular work, made magnificent as much for its story as for the uncommon approach by which it's told.

this story takes place during a state of emergency and a public calamity. it's an unfinished book because it's still waiting for an answer. an answer i hope someone in the world can give me. you? it's a story in technicolor to add a little luxury which, by god, i need too. amen for all of us.
~
i ask: was every story ever written in the world a story of affliction?

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Aug 12, 2007 Michael rated it 1 of 5 stars Recommends it for: rich people trying to understand poor people

This book features perhaps the most annoying narrators in the history of literature, and it's not the good annoying like Holden Caulfield. This narrator repeats himself over and over even contradicting himself and needlessly commenting about how he writes about a girl that just makes her message so much less pronounced. the narrative itself is like a half hour episode of a miniseries with very littler of anything, the characters are all unnappealing and without any charisma whatsoever, which cou...more

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Feb 18, 2013 Tanuj Solanki rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: latin-america, jewish

One does not understand the sanctity of the title, though the novel is near-excellent.

While pure being allows for self-consciousness, it may be so simplistic that it leads to near anonymity. Is it commendable to be like that in our world? - this seems to be one of the questions.

The writer is writing as the reader is reading. Lispector's interventions are very well done / managed. For formal rigour and philosophical inquiry, the novel could stand with the very best.

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Apr 16, 2008 Rodrigo rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2007

Sempre tive um pé atrás em relação à Clarice por conta de uma entrevista a que assisti. O que me incomodava é que ela não se deixava ir muito a fundo. Por mais objetiva que fosse a pergunta do jornalista, ela não se despia daquela aura enigmática, respondendo sempre de maneira oblíqua. O medo era encontrar nos livros muitas frases de efeito e pouco conteúdo. Pura besteira!

A hora da estrela é de uma sensibilidade rara. O narrador estabelece uma relação complexa com a personagem, repleta de ódio,...more

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Dec 05, 2012 [P] rated it 2 of 5 stars

I was watching a film recently about WW2 and it had, as one would expect, a fictionalized representation of Hitler in it. I didn’t occur to me straight away, but after a while it dawned on me that I have a pair of the same style glasses as the evil tyrant, and a similar haircut. As alarming realizations go that one is right up there. I’ll give you another one, I bought this book some time ago and then was informed, not long after purchase, that it is a feminist novel. Let me say that again: a fe...more

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May 11, 2013 M. Sarki rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

So Mr. Moser does the Lispector biography which I plan on reading soon as it arrives in my waiting hands, but then I read this here thing that Moser himself translated and he is making his comments of gushing praise for it saying that the book was the very first exposure he had to Lispector's genius and I am at the very same time finding myself getting a little bit sick to my stomach with all this loving on her, though I do realize she was beautiful in a Marlene Dietrich sort of way, and I also...more

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Feb 23, 2010 Troy rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-in-2010

Clarice Lispector's name has been on my radar for awhile. I heard she was beloved by Borges, Cortazar and Bolano. I also heard she was insanely influential among the Latin American writers who were part of the "cool-set." So I finally decided to pick up one of her books - a small one, which happily is supposed to be one of her best.

The book is written in a clean, sparse, and beautiful style, but the story is anything but simple. The narrative flip flops from the author's ruminations on writing,...more Clarice Lispector's name has been on my radar for awhile. I heard she was beloved by Borges, Cortazar and Bolano. I also heard she was insanely influential among the Latin American writers who were part of the "cool-set." So I finally decided to pick up one of her books - a small one, which happily is supposed to be one of her best.

The book is written in a clean, sparse, and beautiful style, but the story is anything but simple. The narrative flip flops from the author's ruminations on writing, character creation, and how the character and situations seem to write themselves, and then, suddenly, we're following the very depressing story of the character the author is writing about. The character is named Macabea and the author constantly reminds us that she is from the northeast of Brazil, which is a desperately and depressingly poor area. Macabea's story is a steady state of suck, and the author sometimes jumps in and tells us that he isn't fully in control over what is happening. (The fictional author of The Hour of the Star is a man.) Macabea's story is the story of the unlucky, the dispossessed, the abject, but despite that it is a story about faith in life despite having a life filled with nothing but bad luck.

The book is beautiful.
Might even be a five star book.

Lispector's writing style is somewhere between Robbe-Grillet and Djuna Barnes, but it very much her own (it also reads a little bit like Benji's section from The Sound and the Fury). There is a despairing beauty in the story, and throughout a quiet anger at the unfairness of life, but tempered by an awe at the tenacity of life to keep going even when death seems to an outside observer like a better option. Here, read her opening and see what you think:

Everything in 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.

One last thing: she uses a cool technique to show the writer coming up with a "whammy" for the character (bang!) which works beautifully for both the poor woman whose life is nothing but dull, and as a way to show a bit of sudden inspiration on the part of the writer.(less)

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Nov 14, 2008 Jéssica rated it 4 of 5 stars

I am a huge fan of Clarice, her writing style is amazing. if you pay attention to what your reading you'll be able to locate several simbologisms and psycological metaphors.
One of my favorites. Is her short story "Love". You can find it in this site: http://www.shermantranslations.com/lo...
the story describes a moment of epiphany triggered by a blind man chewing gun. The story my look weird at first, but when you start to notice the smal details you realize that every single word was carefully c...more

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Oct 03, 2008 Jonathan Dickstein rated it 4 of 5 stars

"Everything begins with a yes" opens this unique take on an otherwise already written concept - that is, a novel about a writer writing observing another character. Honestly, up until the last several pages, this piece is extremely captivating, especially in terms of the varying perspectives and what ideas stand behind them. I think there is something to be said about writers who write about writing. The stream of conciousness prose really works, keeps the reader interested, despite the almost u...more

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Mar 29, 2008 Elizabeth rated it 5 of 5 stars

"Macabea didn’t worry too much about her own future: to have a future was a luxury. She had learned from her favorite radio program that there were seven billion inhabitants in the world. She felt lost. But it was in her nature to be happy so she soon resigned herself: there were seven billion inhabitants to keep her company."

"Occasionally, she wandered into the more fashionable quarters of the city and stood gazing at the shop windows displaying glittering jewels and luxurious garments in satin...more

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Jul 09, 2007 Rachel rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction

I was assigned this book in college, and fell in love with it. Clarice Lispector tells an almost fairy tale-ish story of Macabea, an impoverished young woman from rural Brazil, who escapes an abusive aunt to try her fortune in Rio. A tiny typist amid a sea of typists, Macabea is a tiny person in the enormity of the city and its dreams, its riches, its possibilities. The poverty of her upbringing, makes her ability to even imagine a different reality somehow pathetic--as she exhalts in the luxuri...more

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Jan 28, 2013 Meagan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: books-i-own

Read more of my reviews at http://meagan-maguire.blogspot.com

Clarice Lispector is considered the most important Jewish writer since Franz Kafka and is possibly the most important Brazilian writer of all time. Her final work before her untimely death from ovarian cancer “The Hour of the Star” illustrates why Lispector is so important. It is also one of the best things I've ever read.
Lispector's critics call her over-indulgent, and she is, but in her commitment to her own vision and her obsessions...more Read more of my reviews at http://meagan-maguire.blogspot.com

Clarice Lispector is considered the most important Jewish writer since Franz Kafka and is possibly the most important Brazilian writer of all time. Her final work before her untimely death from ovarian cancer “The Hour of the Star” illustrates why Lispector is so important. It is also one of the best things I've ever read.
Lispector's critics call her over-indulgent, and she is, but in her commitment to her own vision and her obsessions with the void, death, nothingness, and meaninglessness Lispector pushes the narrative structure to scorching new heights.

The novella is narrated by a male writer who aims to tell the tale of Macabéa, a sweet but pathetic girl. The narrator knows everything about Macabéa to the point where he feels he may know her better than herself. He has no idea why he knows so much. The girl is sweet but pathetic to the point of being grotesque. My sympathy for this isolated and abused victim of society is intermixed by repulsion at her lack of agency and the nature of her disgusting life. Lispector brilliantly creates a character who is both abhorrent and the perfect tragic heroine.

The narrator is afraid to tell his story and takes his time, stalling and going on wild tangents (made even more amazing given that this book clocks in at under 80 pages). Lispector has a true way with words and is easily one of the most quotable authors I have ever read. Here are a few of my favorites:

Truth is always an interior and inexplicable contact
I shall live here the life of a molecule with all its possible bang of atoms
I want to try at least once the lack of taste they say is in the host.
Through this young person I scream my horror of life. Of this life I love so much.
This story has no technique, nor style, it lives from hand to mouth.
Each day is a day stolen from death.
Words are sounds transfused with unequal shadows that intersect, stalactites, lace, transfigured organ music.

Lispector is a true revolutionary. “The Hour of the Star” hits you in the gut. It is blistering, disgusting, and powerful. Sometimes a book comes along that makes you recalculate what it means to be a “great” writer and this is one of them. (less)

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Nov 05, 2012 Leajk rated it 2 of 5 stars Recommends it for: people who likes to project their own pretentions onto hollow works

Recommended to Leajk by: my book club

Shelves: female-author, latin-america

Didn't like the characters, the structure, the plot, well anything, except the language in some parts, but that was not enough to compensate for the rest.

I was quite frustrated with the main character Macabéa for being so hopelessly passive. This would have been fine if she would have had any type of interesting personality traits. But no she's all empty inside with few other interests than Marylin Monroe. I don't demand that protagonists are likeable, but they should at least be somewhat intere...more Didn't like the characters, the structure, the plot, well anything, except the language in some parts, but that was not enough to compensate for the rest.

I was quite frustrated with the main character Macabéa for being so hopelessly passive. This would have been fine if she would have had any type of interesting personality traits. But no she's all empty inside with few other interests than Marylin Monroe. I don't demand that protagonists are likeable, but they should at least be somewhat interesting, especially if there are very few other people in the book. She actually reminds me a bit of how the main character in Doris Lessing's The Grass is Singing is in the beginning of that story. Passive, naïve and with the same craving to go to the movies constantly. In both cases I mostly felt like the writer thought she was being forced to write about a woman that she just wasn't particularly interested in, to symbolise something GRANDE and important. In the mean time both the writer and the reader is much more interested in, and might care more for, the secondary male protagonist.

Come to think about it the book for some reason just reminded me of Camus, could be I'm thinking of the protagonist of The Stranger.

As for the language I remember there being some quite nice quotes that I wrote down for discussion (for my book meeting), and the recurrence of the word explosion that added a menacing but overwrought sense of impending doom. I'm a bit uncertain regarding the exact publication date of this book as to whether it was right before or after her death (Wikipedia claims both), if, and I mean IF, her death was somehow a hinder to her developing the book I could see this growing into something quite nice. Then again I haven't read any of her other works so I don't know, maybe this was just her style.

From the book description: "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."

Yeah, no. Lipsector may have wanted Macabéa to be inwardly free, but she just comes of as kind of dense. An impression which is strengthened by Macabéa falling for this random slimey guy that she practically starts stalking. If your preconceived notion is supposed to be that poor people are street smart, this book certainly tries to challenge that. (less)

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Sep 27, 2012 P.V. LeForge rated it 1 of 5 stars

The location is Rio de Janiero, Brazil, probably in the 1970s.

This is a difficult one to figure. Rated by some as her culminating work and described by others as a masterpiece, there is nothing here I would want my name to be on. It is a short work—only 75 pages—and most of it has nothing to do with the “story.”

It is narrated by someone who calls himself Roderigo S. M., who seemingly has shut himself up in a small room in order to tell this story, but he has trouble getting around to it. Instead...more The location is Rio de Janiero, Brazil, probably in the 1970s.

This is a difficult one to figure. Rated by some as her culminating work and described by others as a masterpiece, there is nothing here I would want my name to be on. It is a short work—only 75 pages—and most of it has nothing to do with the “story.”

It is narrated by someone who calls himself Roderigo S. M., who seemingly has shut himself up in a small room in order to tell this story, but he has trouble getting around to it. Instead, he gives the reader details why he is writing and how he plans to develop the story. Done correctly, this might have been an interesting description of how Lispector herself felt about the writing process; as it is, every bit seems intrusive. It has the feel of a complete dilettante who hasn’t the slightest idea of how to make his words—or himself— interesting. It is as if he is dictating to the reader.

The story itself concerns a young woman from the northeast backwoods. Barely literate, she ekes a living as a typist, sharing a single room with four other young women. All named Maria. At first, the narrator says that she doesn’t have a name but later we learn that it is Macabea—which is said by critics to be a reference to Lispector’s Jewish heritage.

Macabea is ugly, malnourished, poor, and a virgin. She has almost no pleasures (a cold cup of coffee, a day off, a sunny day). Bad at her job, she somehow gets a boyfriend, but loses him to someone with big breasts. She goes to a clairvoyant who tells her that things are going to get much better, but when she leaves she is struck down and killed by a Mercedes. The rantings of the narrator during and after this are even more unbearable than earlier.

It seems that the book was “put together” from scraps of writing that Lispector had scribbled on napkins and other oddments around the house. Her companion was instrumental in getting it into book form. It is hard for me to understand how anyone could think that this book is in any way masterful, in any way not an embarrassment.
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Jan 04, 2012 Dan rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011

an absolute pleasure from beginning to end, and an excellent lesson for any writer attempting to give voice to an "unreliable" narrator.

the story is ostensibly about macabea, a dirt-poor, extremely eccentric "northerner" living in brazil and doing mediocre office work while she pines away about true love, food and mundane radio trivia. but it's also about her equally bizarre, yet strangely philosophical, boyfriend - who spends most of the narrative pontificating out loud about why they shouldn't...more

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Nov 15, 2011 Richard rated it 3 of 5 stars

Rating: 3.875* of five

This is billed as Lispector, a Brazilian pyrotechnician of words, writing her last novel. It's about 80pp long, so I am hard pressed to see how it's anything but a novella as defined by length. Its content, the descent and fall of one of life's losers, places it firmly in novella territory as well. Its beauty and grace of language mark it as a poetic novella. But it's not a complex, nuanced, developed story, so not what I'm willing to call a novel.

But it's brilliant, and it...more Rating: 3.875* of five

This is billed as Lispector, a Brazilian pyrotechnician of words, writing her last novel. It's about 80pp long, so I am hard pressed to see how it's anything but a novella as defined by length. Its content, the descent and fall of one of life's losers, places it firmly in novella territory as well. Its beauty and grace of language mark it as a poetic novella. But it's not a complex, nuanced, developed story, so not what I'm willing to call a novel.

But it's brilliant, and it's beautiful, and it should form a part of your mental furniture. It's fascinating in its presumptive male narrator's chill and malign distance from the heat of life that makes Macabea, the protagonist, both unfurl and wither seemingly simultaneously.

The relationships that Macabea, immigrant to the cold cruel city from the cold cruel countryside, forms are classics of naive toxicity. She's seemingly unable to judge anyone around her...even herself...on any level deeper than the most glistening surface. She's not a bright girl, she's not a pretty girl, and she's got no discernable talent for anything. She's destined to come to a bad end. SPOILER FOLLOWS And she does, under the wheels of a Mercedes (isn't that a subtle way of accusing the haves of killing the have-nots?). END SPOILER

But Lispector, the creatrix, pulls the Oz-curtain aside periodically, dropping the rudimentary and nugatory male narrator into the bin when she has something important to say: "Will I be condemned to death for discussing a life that contains, like the lives of all of us, an inviolable secret? I am desperately trying to discover in the girl's existence at least one bright topaz."

Could it be, I wonder at the end of the story, that there is no bright topaz in some lives? That the brightest sparkle in some humans is just the mineral potential of bones waiting for death to free it? Macabea, "female Maccabee" for those interested in looking for some Biblical enrichment of the tale, makes me think...unwillingly, reluctantly, but honestly...that the answer is Yes.(less)

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Jul 18, 2011 Claire C-g rated it 4 of 5 stars

"I dedicate this narrative to dear old Schumann and his beloved Clara who are now, alas, nothing but dust and ashes. I dedicate it to the deep crimson of my blood as someone in his prime. I dedicate it, above all, to those gnomes, dwarfs, sylphs, and nymphs who inhabit my life. I dedicate it to the memory of my years of hardship when everything was more austere and honourable, and I had never eaten lobster. I dedicate it to the tempest of Beethoven. To the vibrations of Bach’s neutral colors. To...more "I dedicate this narrative to dear old Schumann and his beloved Clara who are now, alas, nothing but dust and ashes. I dedicate it to the deep crimson of my blood as someone in his prime. I dedicate it, above all, to those gnomes, dwarfs, sylphs, and nymphs who inhabit my life. I dedicate it to the memory of my years of hardship when everything was more austere and honourable, and I had never eaten lobster. I dedicate it to the tempest of Beethoven. To the vibrations of Bach’s neutral colors. To Chopin who leaves me weak. To Stravinsky who terrifies me and makes me soar in flames. To Death and Transfiguration, in which Richard Strauss predicts my fate. Most of all, I dedicate it to the day’s vigil and to day itself, to the transparent voice of Debussy, to Marlos Nobre, to Prokofiev, to Carl Orff and Schoenberg, to the twelve-tone composers, to the strident notes of an electronic generation — to all those musicians who have touched within me the most alarming and unsuspected regions, to all those prophets of our age who have revealed me to myelf and made me explode into: me. This me that is you, for I cannot bear to be simply me, I need others in order to stand up, giddy and awkward as I am, for what can one do except meditate in order to plunge into that total void which can only be attained through meditation. Meditation need not bear fruit: meditation an be an end in itself. I meditate without words or themes, What troubles my existence is writing.

And we must never forget that if the atom’s structure is invisible, it is none the less real. I am aware of many things I have never seen. And you too. One cannot prove the existence of what is most real but the essential thing is to believe. To weep and believe. This story unfolds in a state of emergency and public calamity. It is an unfinished book because it offers no answer. An answer I hope someone somewhere in the world may be able to provide. You perhaps? It is a story in technicolour to add a touch of luxury, for heaven knows, I need that too. Amen for all of us."(less)

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Jun 20, 2011 TeacherMrLoria rated it 2 of 5 stars

This is one of the only books I read as an English major in my upper level courses that didn't terribly suck. Existential, feminist, modern, and still actually a little bit good. Who would have guessed? I'll reread it someday. Until then, enjoy the quotes.

Quotes

Let no one be mistaken. I only achieve simplicity with enormous effort. 11

What I am writing is something more than mere invention; it is my duty to relate everything about this girl among thousands of others like her. It is my duty, howev...more

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Nov 24, 2009 Jesse rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-in-2009

"I was flabbergasted to meet that rare person who looked like Marlene Dietrich and wrote like Virginia Woolf." -Gregory Rabassa

Now if that doesn't sell me on an author, I don't know what will. After stumbling upon Why This World A Biography of Clarice Lispector at my local bookstore, and reading the above quote emblazoned boldly upon the back cover, I naturally had to take a look. And apparently many others had the same idea—all of her books in my local library system had daunting hold orders. I...more "I was flabbergasted to meet that rare person who looked like Marlene Dietrich and wrote like Virginia Woolf." -Gregory Rabassa

Now if that doesn't sell me on an author, I don't know what will. After stumbling upon Why This World A Biography of Clarice Lispector at my local bookstore, and reading the above quote emblazoned boldly upon the back cover, I naturally had to take a look. And apparently many others had the same idea—all of her books in my local library system had daunting hold orders. I put my name in for the only title I recognized and waited for my turn to come.

And now that it has, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a bit disappointed. Not at all in the style, in Lispector's elegant, fluid sense of the rhythm of language that remains ravishingly beautiful even in translation—that certainly lived up to expectations. No, it was the content that bothered me—as Michael, who currently has the only vehemently negative review of the book on GR, says, he (rather sarcastically) recommends the book for "rich people trying to understand poor people." And while I don't necessarily agree with anything else in his actual review, he does have a point. The narrative, about a wealthy, unnamed narrator "telling" the story of a poor who apparently unattractive working class girl he has a kind of ambiguous voyeuristic obsession with, is the type of book that attempts to discover a kind transcendental beauty and/or truth in extreme poverty, something I find rather distasteful and makes me more than a bit uncomfortable. For me, the main interest instead comes from the flustered, overwrought narrator writing/relaying the narrative, almost comically aware of his subjectivity to the point it constantly threatens to bring the story to a complete halt. But the fact is, one of his first pronouncements has since become my personal motto:

"So long as I have questions to which there are no answers, I shall go on writing."

And furthermore, I haven't given up on Lispector—in fact, my disappointment with this book actually makes me want to read more...(less)

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Aug 16, 2012 Eugene rated it 5 of 5 stars

a beautiful portrait -- but of whom? is it the poor girl who is its purported subject (and whose inner life is cosmic enough to arrest time)? or is it the novelist who observes divinity in the marketplace (and in the red light district) and renders frail, pure being in reflective aphorisms that are so woven together to make a gleaming, seamless mirror? yes and yes. very great stuff.

"Perhaps I could enhance this story if I were to introduce some difficult technical terms? But that is the problem:...more

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Jun 06, 2012 Shari rated it 5 of 5 stars

This novella should not be read by those looking for realism or linear narrative development.

Beginning with its dedication to Clara and Robert Schumann, and a polyphony of other composers, the work should be read with the heart and ear first, with a mind towards philosophy second, and, lastly, toward the narrative elements.

Yes, this is story, but it's a story demanding sympathy for a protagonist to whom we're not accustomed: the most disposable and insignificant among us. Macabéa may be the sing...more

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Jan 24, 2013 Paul rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: south-american

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...more 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.
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Sep 22, 2010 Nicholas Hansen rated it 1 of 5 stars

I'm not going to go into too much detail because I really didn't like this book. It was all flash with little substance. The story is supposed to be about this tragic character of a Brazilian woman who is universally unloved, unappreciated, and not noticed. Her life is terrible and as you can imagine, even though the writer lies and says continuously thought the book that she really wants there to be a happy ending, the woman's life ends terribly. If you get surprised by this then you don't know...more

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Dec 29, 2012 Carrie Anne rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is the story of an unperson. I don't often use quotes in reviews, but here they are needed; my words aren't as accurate.
"He: --What's the matter? Aren't you someone? People talk about people.
She: --Sorry but I don't think I'm really people.
He: --But everyone's people, my God!" p. 39
Macabea is not a heroine, and this story isn't really about her. It was written in that post-modern anti-sentence form, more like a piece of abstract art than a narrative.
"But then all of a sudden I feel my last...more

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Apr 27, 2008 Aramis rated it 5 of 5 stars

This is the sixth or seventh time I have read this book and it simply gets better each time I return to it. A masterpiece in about seventy pages. If you only read one book by a Brazilian author this should be the one. Not for the faint of heart though as its structure and style often prove problematic for inexperienced readers or those simply seeking escape literature.

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Jun 22, 2009 Ben Loory rated it 2 of 5 stars

lispector is a truly one of a kind writer and this book deserves more than 2 stars on any rational scale, but after The Passion According to G.H. i can't imagine why anyone would bother with this. this is intrusive third person telling a slim realistic tale about a boring nobody girl and a couple other boring nobody characters over a long course of time; The Passion According to G.H. is a claustrophobic first-person account of a single person's sudden religious experience in an abandoned room in...more

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About Clarice Lispector

Clarice escrevia desde que aprendeu a ler, em Recife, onde passou parte da sua infância. Seu primeiro romance, publicado em 1944, foi chamado Perto do Coração Selvagem. Na época, a literatura brasileira era dominada por romances regionalistas mas Clarice surpreendeu a crítica ao lançar romances existencialistas.
Seu romance mais famoso é A Hora da Estrela, publicado antes de sua morte.
Clarice veio...more Clarice escrevia desde que aprendeu a ler, em Recife, onde passou parte da sua infância. Seu primeiro romance, publicado em 1944, foi chamado Perto do Coração Selvagem. Na época, a literatura brasileira era dominada por romances regionalistas mas Clarice surpreendeu a crítica ao lançar romances existencialistas.
Seu romance mais famoso é A Hora da Estrela, publicado antes de sua morte.
Clarice veio a falecer em 9 de dezembro de 1977, um dia antes de seu aniversário, de câncer.
Chegou a traduzir o livro Entrevista com o Vampiro da americana Anne Rice. Foi considerada o Kafka da literatura latino-americana pelo The New York Times em artigo publicado no dia 11 de março de 2005.

Clarice 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.[citation needed]

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) and the great mystic novel The Passion According to G.H. (A Paixão Segundo G.H.). 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 work are common in Brazilian literature and music. Several of her works have been turned into films and she was the subject of a recent biography, Why This World, by Benjamin Moser.(less)

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“Who has not asked himself at some time or other: am I a monster or is this what it means to be a person?” — 103 people liked it

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