Clarice Lispector

In a haunting psychological tale of despair and freedom, Macabea is ugly, underfed, sickly, and unloved yet she fascinates Rodrigo because she is unaware of how unhappy she should be

The Hour of the Star

rida

“Meanwhile the clouds are white and the sky is all blue. Why so much God. Why not a little for men.”

And if one thinks about it carefully, aren't we all mere accidents of nature? […] In fact, I sometimes think that I am not me. I seem to belong to a remote planet, I am such a stranger unto myself. Can this be me? 

Should I divulge that she adored soldiers? She was mad about them. Whenever she caught sight of a soldier, she would think, trembling with excitement: is he going to murder me?

The girl didn't dare ask why she was always being punished. One doesn't have to know everything and not knowing became an important factor in her life.

Not knowing sounds awful, but it was not so awful for the girl knew lots of things just as a dog knows how to wag its tail or a beggar how to feel hungry: things happen and you suddenly know. No one would teach her how to die one day: yet one day she would surely die as if she had already learned by heart how to play the starring role.

In any case, the future looked brighter. The future, at least, had the advantage of not being the present, and the worse can always take a turn for the better.

But I am no longer sure of myself: I must ask, without knowing whom I should ask, if it is really necessary to love the man who slays me; to ask who among you is slaying me.

But the emptiness has the value and appearance of plenty. 

I know splendid adjectives, meaty nouns, and verbs so slender that they travel sharp through the air about to go into action, since words are actions, don’t you agree?

Who hasn’t ever wondered: am I a monster or is this what it means to be a person?

The Hour of the Star quotes

Join the club