Clarice Lispector’s Women Characters Essay Example for Free

Clarice Lispectors Women Characters EssayI sat before my film over one day,And conjured up a vision b ar,Unlike the aspects glad and gay,That erst were found reflected there-The vision of a charr, wildWith more than fair sexly despair.1The Italian libber writer Elsa Morante stated that One womans agony in her room is something so insignificant that it casts no shadow across the great creation2. However true this might be, Clarice Lispector manages to give voice to her fe anthropoid characters feelings in a such overwhelming way that the readers own universe cannot remain indifferent. Reading Lispectors works, especi totallyy her before long stories, is like plunging into an app atomic number 18ntly innocuous moment of a womans biography besides rapidly and unavoidably be dragged into the unreachable depths and the darkest recesses of her psychology. It never turns out to be a merely pleasure trip. Influenced by existentialist authors, Lispectors over-riding worry revolv es around woman condition in its entirety3. It is a definitely mingled and multi- showcaseted matter, which encompasses all the issues of the human condition exasperated by the womanhoods burdens.on board with the unbearable awareness towards the absurdity of life and its revealed lack of meaning, the writer has to deal with the role of the women in a male oriented society, their existential suffe eludes and failures, the signified of relationships and isolation, their unrealized aspirations devoted up to conform to an imposed social scheme, the ideas of family and derangement, their forlorn hopes and submissiveness. The reader is prompted to ask himself to what extent is the woman allowed to be herself before becoming the physical objectification of somebody elses aspirations? The concept of individuality is therefore the pivot of all this speculation Clarice explores the dynamics of self-discovery, the different and everlastingly traumatic ways in which her characters find or are forced to face their true authentic self and the conflict these achievements generate in their life.In this essay, I will pay close attention to the object of the reflect, a recurrent fancy in Lispectors fiction, where it occupies a key role in the process of autoconhecimento e expresso, contemplao e ao, conhecimento das coisas e relaes inter-subjetivas4. In the consideration of this locate, I will draw on the psychological theories that explained the phenomenon of visual self- assignment, highlighting the correspondences in the behaviour of the woman characters. I will in addition refer to the literary criticism that handled with the Lispectorian potncia mgica do olhar5. Then, I will focus on the range of fair(prenominal) figures portrayed in Laos de famlia, pointing out how they underwent the experience of self-awareness, what they have in common and where they are different. Finally, I will take into account Clarices short article Espelho mgico, which I found to be a particularly valuable contribution to this analysis and a sort of locking ring to this paper.Lets start by considering the leitmotif of the mirror and the importance of sight. To canvas to unfold the copious polysemic connotations that the mirror bears, it is worth briefly considering it under a psychoanalytic point of mint. Several are the currents that acknowledged the mirror to be one the more or less powerful cock in the process of the analysis and identification of the self. Jaques Lacan theorised the famous concept of the mirror stage the child starts to identify with the reflection of itself, discerning the I in the mirror and the I outside the mirror. Along with OLTRE The identification, however, comes the sense of alienation, due to the perception of the mirror image as an Other self. Experiencing this scatteredting, the subject keeps searching a constant confirmation of its identity from/by/in the showdown with other lot and objects. By the visual contacts, as a so rt of multiplicity of mirrors, the sense of selfhood can be reinforced by returned gazes of acknowledgement6. The idea that the people interacting with the subject act as mirrors for itself has also been substantiated by Charles Horton Cooley.He went further and advanced the social psychological concept of the looking-glass self, according to which identity is created out of the latent hostility amidst natural impulses that the individual must actively suffer and the social structures that the individual must actively appropriate7. He points out that there are three stages through which a person goes she/he imagines how she must appear to others, she/he imagines the judgment of that appearance, she/he develops her/him self through the judgments of others8. But what happens when the social structures develop a diffused and subjugating system of judgements and bias that deeply interfere with the expression of the individual impulses? The result is deep manipulation of somebodys ow n self, where defence tendencies usually prevail as a compromise between the two tensions.This is actually what happen to Clarices women characters. When they look in the mirror, they see (or glimpse) themselves how they truly are, but also how they are not allowed, or do not dare, to be. This social conditioning is clearly summarised by John Berger To be born a woman has been to be born, within an allotted and confined space, into the keeping of men. The social presence of woman has developed as a result of their ingenuity in hold under such tutelage within such limited space. But this has been at the cost of a womans self being split into two. A woman must continually watch herself because how she appears to others, and ultimately how she appears to men, is of crucial importance for what is normally thought of as the success of her life9Bearing in mind these concepts, lets now delve into the feminine universe of Laos de famlia. The first aspects to remark is that Lispectors cha racters are never uninspired women. They cannot be enclosed in any womanly clich, even if they share the uniform experiences and they sometimes seem to be facets of the same person. Clarice introduces the reader to different women, or again different stages in life of only one daughter, adolescent, wife, mistress, mother, grandmother.Emotional detachment is one of the thing they have in common. They all show insolvable inability to connect with others in a deep and meaningful way. Although being expose and even physically close to their families, they are not emotionally present in the relationships. They dissociate, both experiencing emotional numbing, both restraining their own true feeling. Moreover, they do not find a reliable interlocutor in their partners or friends, because the image that the latter project on them is distorted and limited to the role they unconsciously or not impose on them. As previouslyillustrated, the achievement of self-identity requires an interchang ing dialogical recognition between one I and one other that acknowledge that I as a whole10. Clarices women are left alone. Nevertheless, even when they seem to make up the identity they have been given (therefore being self-denial), their true inner self, their real subjectivity suddenly bursts out.There is a kind of fil rouge that pools all the short stories the narrative nucleus is represented by a moment of conflictive tension, an interior crisis, a rupture. At times, it is sufficient the most trifling event to trigger an epiphany, an second of dramatic awareness. Everything that has been kept suppressed explode in a flood of thoughts, reminiscences and revelations. The body abruptly space-reflection symmetrylyses and time stands still life is revealed, meaning is lost, the measure of identity and freedom are found.But understanding is a responsibility, and Clarice pushes her characters to their limits. They hang on the balance between stepping back or going beyond utterly di soriented, they face the d fretfulness of living. Regarding this point, Professor Earl E. Fitz explains that they come to grips with themselves, with who and what they really are and, finally, react to this unexpectedly experienced flash of insight by either rejecting the new self that would turn up or by actually undertaking the creation of a new self, a new and authentic identity. But the price of real freedom is unceasingly high and appears in Lispectors fiction as the discomforting and solipsistic realisation that we are all alone, isolated in our solitude, and tormented by the need to communicate11.Epiphanies, alienation and incommunicability show close affinities with the literary world depicted by Sartre and Camus. The encounter of the conscience with the reality, more specifically with the experience of the Absurd and the sense of meaningless of life, always generate unease in the protagonists. Even if Lispector has asserted that her nasea is not the nause of Sartre12, th e epiphanic moments are associated with upsetting feelings nausea and daze in Amor, anger in Feliz Aniversrio, hatred in O bfalo, fear in Preciosidade, nausea and sadness in Devaneio e embriaguez duma rapariga ,nausea and derangement in Imitao da rosa.Moreover, Lispectors characters experience these unconscious outburst via their sense of sight, similarly to Sartrian protagonists. In Amor, Anas reality suddenly falls apart with the simple view of a blind man chewing a chewing gum on the tram. The sudden braking of the tram is like a tug to her subconscious, the detonator of her repressed sadness and her existential in-satisfaction. The woman feels an emotional collapse, she is overwhelmed by nausea and compassion.A moment later, she feels emptied and alienated as she wanders through the Jardim Btanico. When she manages to get home, her conserve takes her by the hand, sem olhar para trs, afastando-a do perigo de viver13. So she comes back to her previous existence, but she has now become aware that she loves her world with repugnance, loathing. She represents the women who are conscious of the fact that something essential is missing in their life, that what they are surrounded by is not what they really wanted, is not enough to fulfil them. At the end of the day she look at herself in the mirror, por um instante sem nenhum mundo no corao. Antes de se deitar, como se apagasse uma vela, soprou a pequena flama do dia.14The process is alike in O bfalo. The unnamed protagonist is destroyed by unreciprocated love. Eu te odeio, disse a mulher, muito depressa, a um homem que no a amava. Mas a mulher s sabia amar e perdoar, e se aquela mulher perdoasse mais uma vez, uma s vez que fosse, sua vida estaria perdida. In order to bear the pain, she tries to learn how to hate by the wild nature of the animals. Wandering in a zoo, she encounters a buffalo (something close to the male sexual symbology). Ela no olhou a cara. Olhou os seus olhos. E os olhos do bfalo, os olhos olharam seus olhos. The climax is achieved by the visual contact between their eyes. She feels so jarred that she faints. The condition of woman victim of love finds its catharsis in this epiphany closed to sexual ecstasy.Visual contact and self-perception take on another justness in Preciosidade. The protagonist is an adolescent girl, who tries to avoid having anyone look at her. She feels she must protect an ambiguous preciousness she owns. Either it is referred to her virginity or simply to her being a girl, by eschewing males gazes she knows she will keep from becoming an objectification of their desire.More complex are the eye contacts in the short story Laos de famlia. The title includes the emblematic essence of family relationships. The semantic ambivalence of laos can either be seen in a positive way, love bonds, or in a negative one, like binding chains. The protagonist Catarina and her mother epitomise this ambivalence, in living their strained relationship as a mother and as an adult daughter. Sentiments are no longer expressed, love mixes with hate, visual contact is unbearable. Waiting for the train to leave, the mother looks at herself in theca mirror to fill the emptiness left by the lack of communication with Catarina. Once home, Catarina take a walk with her son, tying him to her in another noxious kind of love binding. Very important is the figure of the husband, left out, excluded. He need her, but awkwardly tries to exercise his apparent power to show mutilate his role.Another strongly symbolic story is Imitao da rosa. The protagonist is Laura, a woman who experienced a rupture, both physical with a neuronic breakdown, both social, not being able to adhere again at the role of wife she used to perform before her illness. The character is therefore split between two attitudes the impersonal woman, who tries to be obedient to the established pattern of being a wife, and the personal woman, that breaks the contract and the social expec tation codes. Roberto Corra state of matter Santos15 analyses the duplicity of Lauras nature and the reflection it has on the relationship with her husband. Corra dos Santos divides her feelings and her behaviours in two moments the Tempo de obedincia and the Tempo de ruptura.During the Tempo de obedincia, the attitude of her husband towards Laura shows a man esquecido de sua mulher, em paz, recostado com bandono whereas Laura is submissa, atende o marido de brao dado, fala sobre coisas de mulheres. During the tempo de ruptura, the husband turns out to be cansado e perplexo, mudo de preocupao, tmido, com um hlito infeliz, while she becomes super-humana, tranqila em seu isolamento brilhante, como un barco tranqilo, de perfeio acordata16.Like the example of Carlotas husband, Lauras husband metaphorically shrinks the more and more his wife finds her dimension of self-confidence. Fitz, E. Earl sums up Consistent with Lispectors view that each of us fight a battle for control of the cha os that envelops us, she shows poignantly how the woman in the story is growing in terms of awareness and self-understanding (tangled as this itself is) while the man with whom she is living is stupidly and dully trapped in his own uninteresting view of reality, dominated by the spurious uncloudedness of his conventional thought, his socially prescribed clichs and unoriginal thinking17In addition to these considerations, it is relevant to stress that the concept of the mirror as fundamental tool in the process of self-perception has also been taken up by Clarice outside her fictional work. Espelho mgico is short article she wrote when she contributed to Dirio da Noite. It was published in 1960, in a culumn entitled S para mulheres, which suggests a hidden feminine complicity that strengthens the message the author wants to conveyedNo s o espelho da madrasta de Branca de Neve que mgico. A verdade que todo espelho tem a mesma magia. Voc no h de perguntar Quem mais bela do que eu. O melhor perguntar ao espelho Como posso ficar mais bela do que eu? Eis os ingredientes para um espelho mgico 1) um espelho propriamente dito, de preferncia daqueles de corpo inteiro 2) voc mesma diante do espelho3) coragem. Coragem para se ver, em vez de se imaginar. S depois de se enxergar realmente, que voc poder comear a se imaginar. Mas lembre-se a imaginao s nos serve quando baseada na realidade. Seu material de trabalho a realidade a respeito de voc mesma. No vou lhe dizer o que voc deve fazer para melhorar de aparncia. No tenho a pretenso de ensinar peixe a nadar. E s uma coisa que voc no sabe que voc sabe nadar. Quero dizer, se voc tiver confiana em voc mesma, descobrir que sabe muito mais do que pensa. Mas, de qualquer modo, estarei aqui para ajudar a voc a no esquecer que sabe.Here, Clarice recurs to the archetype of the magic mirror in the fairy tale, positioning the question of identity in an apparently simple layer of interpretation. The strength of this passa ge, though, resides in the shifting of the cultural pattern of the identification of the self the answer is not any more given by the mirror, but acknowledged directly by the person who mirrors herself. Who is answering is indeed the same woman who asked, providing herself with the true measure of her renewed I descried alone, without the need of something (or somebody) else who sees her from the outside.This is the new espelho mgico Clarice hopes for, where the magic comes from the other side on the glass the person. More than an article, it becomes a suggestion, an exhortation. It takes some efforts, some coragem para se ver, se enxergar, but this is necessary in order to build a new parameter for the individual existence, a new pattern of legitimisation of the self. It is the only way for women to ged rid of the old and tight social and cultural paradigms and to confront themselves with new references based on their quotidian choices and prerogatives.A new perspective is offered, where beauty stops being a primary attribute and leaves its place to self-confidence and fortitude. This new woman holds in her hands a material de trabalho, the realidade a respeito de si mesma. She could represent a new possible social feminine figure, who believes in her capability to promote a change and to be in charge of her own destiny. While in her stories she often left her characters helpless and powerless in front of their mirrors, in the real world Clarice let this mirror become a threshold towards a higher dimension, like an open portal in front of the woman. The article end is contract-like women will try to operate this transformation and the author will watch over her, with her novels and stories.For the aforementioned reasons, there is no doubt that Lispectors fictional universe is as big and deep as the themes it deals with. To understand how her complex feminine characters perceive themselves, it is necessary to take into account the issue of the human condition in its entirety, applied to the point of view of women. Nonetheless, every story she wrote encompasses a multitude of smaller senses and significances, so that more than one reading is needed in order to disclose all of them. Every reader can easily agree with Hlne Cixous, who stated that Clarices text, like Kafkas, are not narratives.They contain a secret, a lesson. But this secret and this lesson are dispersed in the verbal space in such a way that the meaning cannot be savvy at a first reading.18 Psychoanalytic perspective helps to explain her literary explorations of the question of identity, the importance of sight, and the self-perception her characters achieve in their reflection in the mirror or in someone elses eyes. The in-depth analysis of the women in Laos de famlia also provides a comprehensive picture of Clarices profound sensibility and complex psychology. The plot, the setting, the description of the characters and their relational dynamics epitomises Lispectorian imaginary. As far as the mirror is concerned, it undoubtedly hold an important position in Clarices symbolism and recurs also in her non-fictional works. The article Espelho mgico represents a significant contribution in the comprehension of her Weltanschauung, and creates a concrete link between her imaginative world and the patent reality.1 Mary Elizabeth Coleridge The Other Side of a Mirror, 1896 2 Elsa Morante, Arturos Island, p. 1873 Lispector does not actually represent all women in her text, but she rather focuses on the ones she belongs to and presumably knows the most the middle-class white urban women. With the expression woman condition in its entirety I mean the whole range of feminine experiences a given woman can go through during her life. 4 Nunes, Benedito, Clarice Lispector. So Paulo Edies Quron, 1973 p. 95 5 Ibid, p. 956 Lacan, Jaques, The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis. capital of the United Kingdom Penguin. 1994 p 70-72 7 Cooley, Charles H. On egot ism and Social Organization. Chicago University of Chicago Press, 1998 p 20 8 Cooley, Charles H. Human Nature and the Social Order. New York Scribners, 1902. pp. 183-184 9 Berger, John, Ways of Seeing. London Penguin, 197210 See also Psychology of Self. Kohut, Heinz The abstract of the Self. New York International Universities Press, 1971 11 Fitz, E. Earl Clarice Lispector. Boston Twayne Publishers, 1985, p. 48 12 Lowe, Elizabeth. The Passion According to C.L. Elizabeth Lowe interviews Clarice Lispector. Review, 24 p 36 13 Lispector, Clarice, Laos de Famlia. Rio de JaneiroLivraria Jos Olympio Editora S.A., 1976 p 24 14 Ibid, p 2615 Corra dos Santos, Roberto Lendo Clarice Lispector. So Paulo Atual Editora LTDA, 1986 p. 21 16 Lispector, Clarice, Laos de Famlia. Rio de Janeiro Livraria Jos Olympio Editora S.A., 1976 p 36-40 17 Fitz, E. Earl Clarice Lispector. Boston Twayne Publishers, 1985, p. 44 18 Cixous, Hlne, Reading with Clarice Lispector. Trans. By Verena Andermatt Conley. Londo n Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1990 p 98