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A review by kierscrivener
Three Brazilian Tales by Machado de Assis, Annotated and Bibliography: THE ATTENDANT'S CONFESSION,THE FORTUNE TELLER, LIFE by Machado de Assis, Samuel Rocha
4.0
"I could have told you the story of my whole life, which holds many other interesting details: but for that there would be needed time, courage and paper. There is plenty of paper, indeed, but my courage is at low ebb, and as to the time that is yet left me, it may be compared to the life of a candle-flame." –The Attendant's Confession
I picked this collection up on the recommedation of Seji (The Artisan Geek). I adore her channel and she's always an amazing source of new books that are diverse and rare. This was in a list of books that are like Poe. And I definitely get full Poe vibes. With the intense, and introspective prose. The stories that look at people at the end of their sanity. I am so excited to read more of Machado de Assis' work. His indirect sarcastic, ironic narration made me laugh even as it was incredibly insightful and had references from all over literature, tradition and mythology.
Ahasversus: Are these your chains? I see upon them no trace of your tears
Prometheus. I wept them for your humankind.
Ahasverus. And humanity wept far more because of your crime.
Life was very different from The Attendant's Confession and The Fortune Teller but I really loved this short play exploring a conversation between the Wandering Jew (cursed to wander the earth eternally for lack of compassion) and Prometheus (cursed for creating humans and in compassion giving fire). Our backdrop is a world extinct of humans save Ahasverus who finally seeks rest and he finds Prometheus.
I really loved this. I loved how many different things were referenced, the dawn of the modern society and science, with tradition, religion, mythology and discussion. I want more, more of these desperate ideas colliding and discussing.
Quotes:
"Hamlet observes to Horatio that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy. This was the selfsame explanation that was given by beautiful Rita to her lover, Camillo, on a certain Friday of November, 1869, when Camillo laughed at her for having gone, the previous evening, to consult a fortune-teller. The only difference is that she made her explanation in other words." –The Fortune Teller
"He, too, when a child, and even later, had been superstitious, filled with an arsenal of beliefs which his mother had instilled, and which had disappeared by the time he reached twenty. The day on which he rid himself of all this parasitic vegetation, leaving behind only the trunk of religion, he wrapped his superstition and his religion (which had both been inculcated by his mother) in the same doubt, and soon arrived at a single, total negation. Camillo believed in nothing. Why? He could not have answered; he had not a solitary reason; he was content simply to deny everything. But I express myself ill, for to deny is in a sense to affirm, and he did not formulate his unbelief. Before the great mystery he simply shrugged his shoulders and went on."
"The old chaise in which for the first time you rode with your beloved, snuggled together, is as good as the chariot of Apollo. Such is man, and such are the circumstances that surround him."
"then I may die; for I am the last and I close the gate of life."–Life
"Evil will end; the winds will thenceforth scatter neither the germs of death nor the clamor of the oppressed, but only the song of love everlasting and the benediction of universal justice."
"The other men read but a chapter of life; you have read the whole book. What does one chapter know of the other chapter? Nothing. But he who has read them all, connects them and concludes. Are there melancholy pages? There are merry and happy ones, too."
"Eternal justice knew what it was doing: it added idleness to eternity. One generation bequeathed me to the other. The languages, as they died, preserved my name like a fossil. With the passing of time all was forgotten; the heroes faded into myths, into shadow, and history crumbled to fragments, only two or three vague, remote characteristics remaining to it. And I saw them in changing aspect. You spoke of a chapter? Happy are those who read only one chapter of life. Those who depart at the birth of empires bear with them the impression of their perpetuity; those who die at their fall, are buried in the hope of their restoration; but do you not realize what it is to see the same things unceasingly,—the same alternation of prosperity and desolation, desolation and prosperity, eternal obsequies and eternal halleluiahs, dawn upon dawn, sunset upon sunset?"
Are these your chains? I see upon them no trace of your tears
"The description of life is not worth the sensation of life; you shall experience it deeply"
I picked this collection up on the recommedation of Seji (The Artisan Geek). I adore her channel and she's always an amazing source of new books that are diverse and rare. This was in a list of books that are like Poe. And I definitely get full Poe vibes. With the intense, and introspective prose. The stories that look at people at the end of their sanity. I am so excited to read more of Machado de Assis' work. His indirect sarcastic, ironic narration made me laugh even as it was incredibly insightful and had references from all over literature, tradition and mythology.
Ahasversus: Are these your chains? I see upon them no trace of your tears
Prometheus. I wept them for your humankind.
Ahasverus. And humanity wept far more because of your crime.
Life was very different from The Attendant's Confession and The Fortune Teller but I really loved this short play exploring a conversation between the Wandering Jew (cursed to wander the earth eternally for lack of compassion) and Prometheus (cursed for creating humans and in compassion giving fire). Our backdrop is a world extinct of humans save Ahasverus who finally seeks rest and he finds Prometheus.
I really loved this. I loved how many different things were referenced, the dawn of the modern society and science, with tradition, religion, mythology and discussion. I want more, more of these desperate ideas colliding and discussing.
Quotes:
"Hamlet observes to Horatio that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy. This was the selfsame explanation that was given by beautiful Rita to her lover, Camillo, on a certain Friday of November, 1869, when Camillo laughed at her for having gone, the previous evening, to consult a fortune-teller. The only difference is that she made her explanation in other words." –The Fortune Teller
"He, too, when a child, and even later, had been superstitious, filled with an arsenal of beliefs which his mother had instilled, and which had disappeared by the time he reached twenty. The day on which he rid himself of all this parasitic vegetation, leaving behind only the trunk of religion, he wrapped his superstition and his religion (which had both been inculcated by his mother) in the same doubt, and soon arrived at a single, total negation. Camillo believed in nothing. Why? He could not have answered; he had not a solitary reason; he was content simply to deny everything. But I express myself ill, for to deny is in a sense to affirm, and he did not formulate his unbelief. Before the great mystery he simply shrugged his shoulders and went on."
"The old chaise in which for the first time you rode with your beloved, snuggled together, is as good as the chariot of Apollo. Such is man, and such are the circumstances that surround him."
"then I may die; for I am the last and I close the gate of life."–Life
"Evil will end; the winds will thenceforth scatter neither the germs of death nor the clamor of the oppressed, but only the song of love everlasting and the benediction of universal justice."
"The other men read but a chapter of life; you have read the whole book. What does one chapter know of the other chapter? Nothing. But he who has read them all, connects them and concludes. Are there melancholy pages? There are merry and happy ones, too."
"Eternal justice knew what it was doing: it added idleness to eternity. One generation bequeathed me to the other. The languages, as they died, preserved my name like a fossil. With the passing of time all was forgotten; the heroes faded into myths, into shadow, and history crumbled to fragments, only two or three vague, remote characteristics remaining to it. And I saw them in changing aspect. You spoke of a chapter? Happy are those who read only one chapter of life. Those who depart at the birth of empires bear with them the impression of their perpetuity; those who die at their fall, are buried in the hope of their restoration; but do you not realize what it is to see the same things unceasingly,—the same alternation of prosperity and desolation, desolation and prosperity, eternal obsequies and eternal halleluiahs, dawn upon dawn, sunset upon sunset?"
Are these your chains? I see upon them no trace of your tears
"The description of life is not worth the sensation of life; you shall experience it deeply"