Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.42 AVERAGE
3.42 AVERAGE
"Esforcem-se para entrar pela porta estreita, porque eu lhes digo que muitos tentarão entrar e não conseguirão. Lucas 13:24.
Este é primeira obra de Gide que leio e por isto minha leitura foi sem expectativa e até distraída, por uns momentos cheguei compreender as nuances teológicas/psicanalítica desta estória, mas logo me distraia novamente com a ambiguidade e profundidade semântica da narrativa. Na segunda leitura consegui apreciar esse "enfadonho nada" que a primeira vista parece ser a obra,descrita como de um "amor trágico " que desde as primeiras páginas já se adivinha um desfecho infeliz , como uma breve e dolorosa despedida.
Jerome e Alissa tem uma estranha e incerta relação de amor que se inicia na infância, do qual a influência de acontecimentos,comportamento e religiosidade dos adultos, afetam a realização deste amor platônico e espiritual para o carnal e sacramental na vida adulta.
Especialmente Alissa, uma heroína complexa, talvez inspirada em santa "Teresa de Ávila", com uma fé histérica que se martiriza e auto sacrifica entre a duvida e a obediência religiosa/fanática, entre o amor à Deus e amor mundano que Jerome oferece, levando a desgastes físicos e psíquicos. O que a levou a este caminho de isolamento de amigos,família, amor e recusa da felicidade?
Me surpreendeu o conflito teológico apresentado aqui, com a repressão sexual e moral que envolve as mulheres desta época, do qual se auto reprovam e condenam a si e outras.
Também do crescente asceticismo de Alissa em contraste com a perda da fé de Jerome e sua vivência fora do alcance religioso que outrora qo ligava à ela, os distanciando em definitivo .
Durante a leitura consegui lembrar de um conto de Bunin " Cleansing Morning", que também envolve uma enigmática e pensativa jovem que renúncia aos prazeres do mundo para renascer na fé ,mas num diferente contexto da Rússia.
Enfim é sobre decisões cruciais ,que certo ou errado, um enfrenta na vida adulta ,em busca da identidade e liberdade individual, embora ilusório, seja qual for a consequências se vai até ao fim, com o risco de perder não só a alma como a vida.
Este é primeira obra de Gide que leio e por isto minha leitura foi sem expectativa e até distraída, por uns momentos cheguei compreender as nuances teológicas/psicanalítica desta estória, mas logo me distraia novamente com a ambiguidade e profundidade semântica da narrativa. Na segunda leitura consegui apreciar esse "enfadonho nada" que a primeira vista parece ser a obra,descrita como de um "amor trágico " que desde as primeiras páginas já se adivinha um desfecho infeliz , como uma breve e dolorosa despedida.
Jerome e Alissa tem uma estranha e incerta relação de amor que se inicia na infância, do qual a influência de acontecimentos,comportamento e religiosidade dos adultos, afetam a realização deste amor platônico e espiritual para o carnal e sacramental na vida adulta.
Especialmente Alissa, uma heroína complexa, talvez inspirada em santa "Teresa de Ávila", com uma fé histérica que se martiriza e auto sacrifica entre a duvida e a obediência religiosa/fanática, entre o amor à Deus e amor mundano que Jerome oferece, levando a desgastes físicos e psíquicos. O que a levou a este caminho de isolamento de amigos,família, amor e recusa da felicidade?
Me surpreendeu o conflito teológico apresentado aqui, com a repressão sexual e moral que envolve as mulheres desta época, do qual se auto reprovam e condenam a si e outras.
Também do crescente asceticismo de Alissa em contraste com a perda da fé de Jerome e sua vivência fora do alcance religioso que outrora qo ligava à ela, os distanciando em definitivo .
Durante a leitura consegui lembrar de um conto de Bunin " Cleansing Morning", que também envolve uma enigmática e pensativa jovem que renúncia aos prazeres do mundo para renascer na fé ,mas num diferente contexto da Rússia.
Enfim é sobre decisões cruciais ,que certo ou errado, um enfrenta na vida adulta ,em busca da identidade e liberdade individual, embora ilusório, seja qual for a consequências se vai até ao fim, com o risco de perder não só a alma como a vida.
challenging
emotional
sad
tense
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
Beautiful clear, readable prose, full of memorable images and turns of phrase. Some credit must go to the translator, Dorothy Bussy, for that, who knew Gide, and worked on some of the translations with him. Alissa loves her cousin, Jerome, and he loves her, but Alissa is also devoutly religious, and comes to believe that the two cannot marry because they would love each other more than they love God. This ultimately ends in tragedy and loss. It's hard for a modern atheist to fully understand Alissa's reasoning, but Gide's ability to capture atmosphere and character transforms this strange premise into something moving and gripping. I've yet to be fully convinced by the characters and plot of Gide novel, but his prose and atmosphere are so compelling that I'm going to keep reading his work.
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Un traumatisme d'enfance, la descente aux enfers de la dépression et les ravages de la bigoterie... :-(
The first chapter had a lot of promise, but as the book went on I could not keep up. the story was slow and fast at the same time, giving no opportunity to digest events or thoughts. The reasoning behind the characters' behaviours was so foreign to me that I just could not enjoy this read.
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Not for me
In fact the novel for Gide may be about the incompatibility of the ecstasy of god's love and the ecstasy of romantic love, or love as idolatry, or even the dangers of a cloistered sort of Christianity. But the true tragedy is Alissa's situation, tethered to one limited sphere and with no hope of escape. She has one spark of radical insight (which flares up in her letters when she confesses how annoyed she was to find Jerome's didactic markings in a poem she thought she had discovered herself, so that even her private readings are pre-circumscribed), but she immediately, piously, extinguishes it (although it's noteworthy that she afterward reads only books she knows he would never deign to open). Her intellectual ambition manifests itself in the only form available to her: martyrdom. When her attempt to martyr herself on her sister's behalf is thwarted, she fixes her sight on the object of her love, whom she aggrandizes to mystic proportions, as the worthy receptor of her sacrifice (she will save him from diversion so that he might achieve his true purpose: oneness with god). Because the social repression of the young women is so obviously the actual perpetrator of the tragedy, it's hard to focus on the other complexities built into and around even the very structure of Gide's romance.
notes:
"[...] I saw that strait gate through which we must strive to enter. I fancied it, in the dream in which I was plunged, as a sort of press into which I passed with effort and with an extremity of pain, that yet had in it as well, a foretaste of heavenly felicity. And again this gate became the door of Alissa's room; in order to enter in at it I squeezed myself--I emptied myself of all that I contained of selfishness . . . 'Because strait is the gate which leadeth unto life,' [...] and beyond all maceration, beyond all sorrow, I imagined--I had the presentiment of another joy, pure, seraphic, mystic, for which my soul was already athirst." (29, c I)
Jerome equates love with deity. Idolatry.
"Against the snare of virtue I was defenseless. All heroism attracted and dazzled me, for I could not separate it from love." (160, c VII)
very De Sade in some ways.
notes:
"[...] I saw that strait gate through which we must strive to enter. I fancied it, in the dream in which I was plunged, as a sort of press into which I passed with effort and with an extremity of pain, that yet had in it as well, a foretaste of heavenly felicity. And again this gate became the door of Alissa's room; in order to enter in at it I squeezed myself--I emptied myself of all that I contained of selfishness . . . 'Because strait is the gate which leadeth unto life,' [...] and beyond all maceration, beyond all sorrow, I imagined--I had the presentiment of another joy, pure, seraphic, mystic, for which my soul was already athirst." (29, c I)
Jerome equates love with deity. Idolatry.
"Against the snare of virtue I was defenseless. All heroism attracted and dazzled me, for I could not separate it from love." (160, c VII)
very De Sade in some ways.
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
A tender, cumbersome romance between hyperreligious Alissa and her yearning, over-passionate cousin Jerome is the sole subject of this nouvelle, a companion piece to The Immoralist. Endless anticipatory lovey-dovey whining thinly veiled as intimate philosophizing ensues, in both gentle, adoring prose and messy, trite passages. Piles of somewhat inexcusable back and forth love garble bring what would be a fine book down several rungs on the ladder of literary greatness. The final three pages are exceptional though, a trembling summation of the fervent emotion captured in this tragic tale. Best served over two patient spring mornings.