The journey one takes toward Clarice Lispector has a great deal to do with the way she is read. I came to her through Helene Cixous, and therefore she (CL) has become inseparable from me, as I experiment with my reading of her, paying almost as much attention to my internal carry-on-chorus that wobbles along […]
Category Archives: Book Reviews
June
28
Água Viva – Clarice Lispector and reading the invisable text. (Book Review)
posted by lisathatcher
June
28
The Hour of the Star: Clarice Lispector speaks on life, death and the question ‘Who am I?’
posted by lisathatcher
Everything in the world began with a yes. One molecule said yes to another molecule and life was born. But before prehistory there was the prehistory of prehistory and there was the never and there was the yes. It was ever so. I do not know why, but I do know the universe never […]
April
02
The Notebook – Agota Kristof and a sensual, cold, cruel passion. (Book review)
posted by lisathatcher
The Notebook Author: Agota Kristof Translator: Alan Sheridan Publisher: Grove/Atlantic Published first in French in 1986 and then translated into thirty languages after Kristof won the European prize for French literature, The Notebook (the first in a trilogy) is one of the most disturbing accounts of war-torn society because of its focus, not on the […]
January
06
In the Future this Will Not be Necessary – Paul Samael and the cathartic voice. (Book review)
posted by lisathatcher
In The Future This Will Not Be Necessary by Paul Samael Published June 2012, Smashwords, ISBN: 9781476248400 Stream of consciousness, in literary theory, often represents the direct thoughts of the protagonist together with all that monkey-jumping-from-tree-to-tree thinking that is both the bane of every Westerners life together with being the primary impulse behind creativity and imagination. In linguistics and […]
January
05
Hypothermia – Álvaro Enrigue’s journey through hell (Book Review)
posted by lisathatcher
As I was leaving his office, my right hand touched the gold fountain pen in my shirt pocket, a gift from my sister when I finished my BA. We call it la pluma de Dumbo, which is to say – because pluma is plume is feather is quill is pen – Dumbo’s feather, because until […]
January
04
The First Light of Evening – Mark Ernest Pothier and the beauty of solitude. (Story Review)
posted by lisathatcher
The First Light of Evening is a lovely little short story available through the Kindle single range for free. It’s another of those examples of good writing available free of charge or through independent publishing as I already highlighted this week in my post about the Free Indie Reader. (Update – I just discovered that […]
January
01
The Free Indie Reader #1 – Vive la revolution! (Book Review)
posted by lisathatcher
There is no doubt now (and there was doubt for years) that publishing is undergoing a global transformation. Battles in the war for or against transformation are being held on many fields: Online v’s Real Life book stores / Small v’s Large Press / Print Media v’s zines and blogs / E books v’s hardcopy […]
December
30
Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marraige – The simplified world of Alice Munro. (Book review)
posted by lisathatcher
Alice Munro didn’t just win the Nobel Prize for literature this year, she also won the more elusive crown of being one of the few writers to win without controversy and possibly the only female winner to do so. That she won is no surprise in Canada where her books regularly grace the best seller […]
November
19
Harvest – Jim Crace speaks through time. (Book Review)
posted by lisathatcher
Wheat – like men and women – benefits from being crushed. To be without the words to say it, is to be inhuman. Jim Crace has claimed that Harvest is his final novel which means this is the end of writings that seek to give voice to the voiceless in history. Harvest is a style of […]
October
13
The Luminaries – Eleanor Catton and the knowing influence of the infinite sky. (Book Review)
posted by lisathatcher
The Luminaries is a character driven novel in the style of the Victorian novel, meaning particular details about each character are written in small sidelines and circular explanatory asides that draw the reader close to each character, but also result in the kind of distant analysis that, for example, Jane Austen is so famous for. […]
Lisa Thatcher 