Selected Cronicas: Essays (New Directions Paperbook)

Selected Crônicas gathers the newspaper columns of the Brazilian writer Clarice Lispector. This collection captures Lispector's gifted voice and supplies a view of Brazil from her childhood, after her Ukrainian parents emigrated there, until the last of her columns in 1973. The stories in this volume are colored with childhood memories and a belief in the redemptive promise of justice. Brazilian newspapers have a history of intellectual journalism, although the period during which Lispector wrote these crônicas was defined by military dictatorship, censorship of the press, and political repression. It was also a time of rapid economic growth, and amid these varied pressures, she played the role of conscience, reminding her readers of unshakeable memories and unmovable truths. What Lispector had to say could only be conveyed in a literary manner for the most pragmatic of reasons, but her delightful stories suggest it was the best means no matter what she had been permitted.