The Passion According to G.H. - I'll Never Be The Same

Well... there you have it.

Some authors have the ability to pull the veil back on the lived experience of being a human and craft (via language) expressions that call forth something we didn't even know was inside of us.

Clarice Lispector is such an author.

The Passion According to G.H. is the first novel that I've finished by her and it will not be the last.

I savored this work.

I literally saturated myself with every word.

--- To otherwise is to do yourself a disservice. Like Proust, Lispector HAS to be slowly digested. Instantly paragraphs must be reread. You have to allow your subconscious and conscious mind time enough to understand what is happening. 

I oftentimes shy away from telling anyone how they should do anything (especially reading), but I feel compelled to say it.

Lispector's work gives one the sense that if you just read the words, somehow at the end of the paragraph you'll grasp it. This isn't true.

It's that mystical element to her writing that transfixes you.

hot organic coffee everyday of my life

In The Passion According to G.H., Lispector helps us to contemplate our our existence as we ponder with G.H. her own place in the balance of things.

We are confronted with the awareness of the "I" in which we present ourselves to the world may be an unreflected upon self and therefore invalid. False. 

I know that this is a work I will be rereading for the rest of my life.

I LOVE that about great literature. It helps me to remember one of my favorite things to remind readers, "If it isn't worth reading twice, it isn't worth reading once".

I pray that you will pick up Lispector's work. I am sure to buy every one of her translated works for my kindle and then for my physical library.

THIS is a bold statement. I only own 25 books, so the digital plus physical editions of her novels tell you dear reader, just how special and infinitely rereadable Lispector is.

I'm off to further contemplate the meaning of my existence. Thank you Clarice for putting your work into the world. And bless the translators all of whom (after decades of only being available in Portuguese) have provided them for English readers.

With a grateful heart.

Happy reading my slow living friends.