averij's review against another edition
challenging
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
ube_cake's review against another edition
5.0
"For now Macabeá was nothing more than a vague feeling on the dirty cobble stones. I could leave her lying on the street and simply not finish the story. But no: I'll go on to where the air runs out, I'll go to where the great gale leaps away howling (...)"
Clarice Lispector's 1977 novel "The Hour of the Star" is a story within a story, of an author (Rodrigo S.M.) who sketches out, in Cezanne-esque brush-strokes, the life of Macabeá: from her birth in poverty to her untimely death.
Though the novel reads like a stream of unedited drafts annotated with oft-tangential commentary, I am of the opinion that it is, in fact, Lispector's ars poetica. Here, she pulls back the proverbial curtains to reveal what it means to create with the power of words. With Rodrigo as her mouthpiece, she asks questions on the obligations of a writer, the relationship between them and their creations (playing around with the Pygmalion myth), and whether an author is fit to tell their tale. The last point being especially relevant in the current age: exploring realities that aren't ours (e.g. not belonging to the same race/ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic status) and running the risk of turning representations into spectacles.
To interpret this novel is to confront the fact that it was the last to be published in Lispector's lifetime (though not the last to be written). By virtue of her death from ovarian cancer at the age of 57, we are forced to see this as a work from her "late period". However, as one reads the pages of this novel, filled with blood-red living prose so different from her previous works, one can get the sense of a Lispector entering a new period, a Lispector being reborn ["(...) in the agony of pleasure that is death. I, who symbolically die several times just to experience the resurrection."]. God knows what else she could have written, and what else the world missed out on, after this and her "Breath of Life".
As if guided by premonition, she writes: "For at the hour of death a person becomes a shining movie star (...)".
Following her untimely death, Clarice Lispector is survived by her many works of fiction (this ranking to be amongst her finest) that continue to captivate readers and influence authors around the world. Do not walk, run and get this book: it's amazing.
Clarice Lispector's 1977 novel "The Hour of the Star" is a story within a story, of an author (Rodrigo S.M.) who sketches out, in Cezanne-esque brush-strokes, the life of Macabeá: from her birth in poverty to her untimely death.
Though the novel reads like a stream of unedited drafts annotated with oft-tangential commentary, I am of the opinion that it is, in fact, Lispector's ars poetica. Here, she pulls back the proverbial curtains to reveal what it means to create with the power of words. With Rodrigo as her mouthpiece, she asks questions on the obligations of a writer, the relationship between them and their creations (playing around with the Pygmalion myth), and whether an author is fit to tell their tale. The last point being especially relevant in the current age: exploring realities that aren't ours (e.g. not belonging to the same race/ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic status) and running the risk of turning representations into spectacles.
To interpret this novel is to confront the fact that it was the last to be published in Lispector's lifetime (though not the last to be written). By virtue of her death from ovarian cancer at the age of 57, we are forced to see this as a work from her "late period". However, as one reads the pages of this novel, filled with blood-red living prose so different from her previous works, one can get the sense of a Lispector entering a new period, a Lispector being reborn ["(...) in the agony of pleasure that is death. I, who symbolically die several times just to experience the resurrection."]. God knows what else she could have written, and what else the world missed out on, after this and her "Breath of Life".
As if guided by premonition, she writes: "For at the hour of death a person becomes a shining movie star (...)".
Following her untimely death, Clarice Lispector is survived by her many works of fiction (this ranking to be amongst her finest) that continue to captivate readers and influence authors around the world. Do not walk, run and get this book: it's amazing.
tumblehawk's review against another edition
4.0
Such a weird little novella. I don’t usually begin my relationship to an author by reading their final work, but I did with Clarice Lispector. Not sure I always understood what was happening or why, but enjoyed it all the way through nonetheless. This was a fun slim but dense story to read in one sitting. It’s a narrator telling the story of a girl, but he’s also constantly reflecting on the idea of storytelling, openly making it up as he goes along, reflecting on how tired he is of telling the story. It feels like a roughly slapped together hastily improvised story but you can tell that the real writer behind the narrator, Lispector herself, is in complete control. Fun.
kilig's review against another edition
4.0
沒什麼情節的故事，詩意而又特別的語言是吸引人讀下去的關鍵。每個人不思考都可以是瑪卡貝婭，連自己的不幸都意識不到，而思考和寫作可以是「我之為我」，痛苦，但接著活。
rileymaeburns's review against another edition
challenging
dark
funny
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
joewhistle's review against another edition
5.0
Easily my favorite piece of writing by Clarice, so much to say, so I'll opt to say nothing at all which is how she would've wanted it.
onyifans's review against another edition
4.0
this is kinda like if squidward wrote the story of SpongeBob
Other things i thought about while reading:
The Bible
Either/or - Kierkegaard
Pretty little liars
Phenomenology of spirit
Motherhood - Sheila heti
Time shelter (which I haven’t read yet couldn’t stop eyeing on my shelf)
And of course Being and Nothingness
Other things i thought about while reading:
The Bible
Either/or - Kierkegaard
Pretty little liars
Phenomenology of spirit
Motherhood - Sheila heti
Time shelter (which I haven’t read yet couldn’t stop eyeing on my shelf)
And of course Being and Nothingness
mybrilliantbasset's review against another edition
4.0
i thought this would be too deep for me but it ended up being okay