Bibliographic Information

The hour of the star

Clarice Lispector ; translated with an afterword by Giovanni Pontiero

(A New Directions paperbook, 733)

New Directions, 1992, c1986

Other Title

A hora da estrela

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Note

Originally published (English translation): [Manchester], Great Britain : Carcarnet Press, 1986

Description and Table of Contents

Description

Narrated by the cosmopolitan Rodrigo S.M., this brief, strange, and haunting tale is the story of Macabea, one of life's unfortunates. Living in the slums of Rio and eking out a poor living as a typist, Macabea loves movies, Coca-Colas, 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 the realization that for all her outward misery, Macabea 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 book she takes readers close to the true mystery of life and leave us deep in Lispector territory indeed.

by "Nielsen BookData"

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Details

  • NCID
    BA84966888
  • ISBN
    • 0811211908
  • Country Code
    us
  • Title Language Code
    eng
  • Text Language Code
    eng
  • Original Language Code
    por
  • Place of Publication
    New York
  • Pages/Volumes
    96 p.
  • Size
    21 cm
  • Classification
  • Subject Headings
  • Parent Bibliography ID
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