A Discreet Exit Through the Back Door The Author and the Creation of Woman in Clarice Lispector’s A hora da estrela

Abstract

This paper deals with the last work of fiction, written by Brazilian author Clarice Lispector in her lifetime, A hora da estrela, or Hour of the Star. A complex work of fiction, though small in size, which might be termed a metafictional novel, a self-conscious narrative, or a story of a story which addresses directly its own creation. This is a story of a story, for one of Lispector’s main creations is the narrator Rodrigo S.M. who becomes the author, creates the character of Macebéa and at the same time himself. Therefore, one could even talk about a kind of
Genesis. The book revolves in part around the relationship between the author and creation, creator and character, and raises complex and persistent questions about the creative process, fiction and the other side of the mirror; reality, society, the world. This is a story that deals directly with fiction, casting a magical light on love and creation, life and death, reality and creativity. It casts a special light on the various levels of narrative on which the novel is built, where the boundaries between levels are drawn into the fiction themselves,
where the author, implied author, protagonist and reader collide and nearly merge. At heart it is a work written by a female author about a male author who creates a female character at the same time as he creates himself. This article examines the “male author” within the story and the creation of the protagonist, a female character; a process marked by the relationship between love and destruction, which is further complicated when the reader is drawn into that relationship along with the real-life author, Clarice Lispector.

Keywords: Clarice Lispector, Hour of the Star, Brazilian literature, metafiction,
literary analysis