Even without the epigraph from James Joyce— He was alone. He was unheeded, happy, and near to the wild heart of life —I would’ve recognized the influence of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man on the novel. Its beginning is a delight as the young protagonist plays with and thinks about words: “She went over to the little table where the books were, played with them by looking at them from a distance.” Either I light up and am wonderful, fleetingly wonderful, or I am obscure, wrapped in curtains. Lídia, whatever she is, is immutable, always with the same bright base.”

Clarice Lispector was born in the Ukraine and was taken to Brazil as a young child. She was a law student, editor, translator, and newswriter, who traveled widely, spending eight years in the United States. "Family Ties" (1960) is a collection of short stories revealing Lispector's existentialist view of life and demonstrating that even family ties and social relationships are temporary. Although tied to each other and to the outside world, the characters are finally totally alone and separate. Lispector received praise from American critics for "The Apple in the Dark" (1967), a novel about a guilt-ridden man's search for the ultimate knowledge (Eve's apple), which he believes will bring him hope. Lispector's books are being translated into various languages in Europe, especially in France, where the critic Helene Cixous is one of her great admirers and a promoter of her works.

I met Clarice Lispector at the exact moment that she published Near to the Wild Heart. The meeting took place in a restaurant in Cinelândia. We had lunch and our conversation strayed from literary matters. … The least I can say is that she was stunning. It was autumn, the leaves in the square were falling, and the grayness of the day helped underscore the beauty and luminosity of Clarice Lispector. Alongside the foreign climate was that strange voice, the guttural diction which rings in my ears to this day.

Norisi imt ir cituoti gabalais (nors šiaip tiesiog norisi skaityt ir skaityt tuos gabalus vis iš naujo): In her solo exhibition at the Blenheim Walk Gallery, Katrina Cowling adopts a critical eye and an exploratory approach to interrogate material and metaphor in the post-industrial city. And being a married woman, that is, a person with her destiny all mapped out. From then on all you do is wait to die. I thought not even the freedom to be unhappy is preserved because you are dragging another person around with you. There is someone who is always observing you, who scrutinizes you, who sees your every move. And even the weariness of living has a certain beauty when it is born alone and desperate - I thought. But as a couple, eating the same bland bread every day, watching your own defeat in the other person’s defeat … All this without considering the weight of your habits reflected in the other person’s habits, the weight of the common bed, the common table, the common life, preparing and threatening the common death. I always said; never.” I don’t know a thing, I am able to give birth to a child and I don’t know a thing. God will receive my humility and will say: I was able to give birth to a world and I don’t know a thing.”So it seems as if Lispector more or less sleepwalked through the preparation of her book for publishing, allowing others to make all the important decisions. But when we realise that she had written the book over a very short period while working full-time as a journalist, studying for a law degree, and obeying the conventions of 1942 Brazilian society by getting formally engaged - then we are less surprised. When did she sleep, never mind make decisions about her book? This is my first Lispector book, but I already know I will be intimately familiar with all of her writing. She's the sort of writer who'll show you eternity in a blink. Or to be more poignant and pretentiously referential, she'll show you fear in a handful of dust. And all of that fear is the same: crippling existential agony.