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4.04 AVERAGE
4.04 AVERAGE
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
I completely fell for Too Much of Life by Clarice Lispector. Even months later, her writing still sticks with me. I missed that feeling so much that I picked up The Hour of the Star and I was hooked from the very first sentence.
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
this author is wonderful - her prose is weird, singular, evocative. this, her last novella, is sad and surreal, and i have no doubt i’ll return to it.
“E minha vida, mais forte do que eu, responde que quer porque quer vingança e responde que devo lutar como quem se afoga, mesmo que eu morra depois. Se assim é, que assim seja.”
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Clarice Lispector’s The Hour of the Star is a strange, startling, and deeply beautiful novella that somehow captures the immensity of a human life in fewer than 100 pages. Told through the erratic, self-conscious voice of a male narrator named Rodrigo S.M., the story follows Macabéa — a poor, awkward young typist from the Northeast of Brazil — whose life is almost unremarkable on the surface, yet Lispector turns her into something unforgettable.
The narrator constantly interrupts himself, questions his authority, contradicts what he says, and even wrestles with how to represent Macabéa’s inner life. The result is both intimate and disorienting — like watching someone think on the page in real time.
Macabéa is naive, often unaware of her own suffering, yet her existence presses down with emotional weight. It’s amazing how Lispector can sketch such a layered character with so few brushstrokes. Macabéa isn’t tragic in a big, dramatic way — she’s tragic because she’s barely seen, and that’s what makes her story so quietly devastating.
The themes of poverty, identity and existential isolation are handled with razor-sharp subtlety. Lispector doesn’t moralize or explain. She observes, questions, fragments, and reveals — and in that space, something haunting happens.
The narrator constantly interrupts himself, questions his authority, contradicts what he says, and even wrestles with how to represent Macabéa’s inner life. The result is both intimate and disorienting — like watching someone think on the page in real time.
Macabéa is naive, often unaware of her own suffering, yet her existence presses down with emotional weight. It’s amazing how Lispector can sketch such a layered character with so few brushstrokes. Macabéa isn’t tragic in a big, dramatic way — she’s tragic because she’s barely seen, and that’s what makes her story so quietly devastating.
The themes of poverty, identity and existential isolation are handled with razor-sharp subtlety. Lispector doesn’t moralize or explain. She observes, questions, fragments, and reveals — and in that space, something haunting happens.
If you’re looking for a conventional story arc or clear resolution, this may frustrate you. But if you love psychological depth, philosophical questions, and writing that challenges the form itself, The Hour of the Star is an unforgettable experience.
Idk, I'd recommend this to experimental fuckers who think too much about themselves.
Idk, I'd recommend this to experimental fuckers who think too much about themselves.
reflective
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
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced