The Complete Stories

By: Clarice Lispector, Katrina Dodson, Benjamin Moser

Narrated by: full cast

Here, gathered in one volume, are the stories that made Clarice a Brazilian legend. Originally a cloth edition of 86 stories, now we have 89 in all, covering her whole amazing career, from her teenage years to her deathbed. In these pages, we meet teenagers becoming aware of their sexual and artistic powers, humdrum housewives whose lives are shattered by unexpected epiphanies, old people who don't know what to do with themselves - and in their stories, Clarice takes us through their lives - and hers - and ours.

©2019 Clarice Lispector and Katrina Dodson (P)2019 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

I feel like this was a window into one woman’s experience that may very well go beyond most things I have read thus far.

I liked so many things about these stories, but more than anything the raw intimacy was brilliant and kind of astounding 

Wonderful Collection

Almost twenty-three hours of short stories is a bit intimidating, but I finished it and do not regret it one bit! Mind you, I would not recommend listening to this straight, but rather listening to a few stories here and there as a break from other works. I did it over the course of several months. I chose to go in order to see how Clarice Lispector's style progressed throughout her life.

Anyone unfamiliar with Lispector is probably better off starting smaller, but for a fan, this comprehensive collection of every story she ever wrote, in chronological order, is a gem. From her weaker early stories to her truly bizarre later ones (which she called "anti-literature"), Lispector is never quite quantifiable. Her trademark is her neurotic characters coupled with her elliptical, philosophical, and dense narration style which peers into their inner states. A lot of them seem just on the brink of madness, or mildly disturbed, at the very least. Yet in these characters it is impossible to not see a real humanity, with all its flaws, and to relate to them, perhaps more than one would wish.

The cast of narrators for this audiobook is excellent. I could not find a flaw in the bunch. Lispector utilizes characters of all ages and genders (though predominantly female), and the narrators here are selected well for each piece. The older women are voiced by a mature-sounding female narrator, while the younger ones are voiced by suitably younger-sounding narrators. Each narrator gets the cadence of Lispector's writing just right. It sounds to me as though they have been coached to pronounce the Portuguese words correctly, though not speaking Portuguese I cannot be sure.

One would never think a 70-year-old woman wandering around lost in a stadium would make for an interesting story, but in the hands of Clarice Lispector (and with an excellent narrator), it is fascinating. She is truly one of the best authors of the 20th century and shamefully unrecognized in English. Of course, like any story collection this size, there are misses. But it is well worth the purchase.

The duality of aconflicted damsel

I had so much expectations about Clarice. Yes, she has her way with the words. But it gets tiring to hear First World problems from a bourgeoisie, story after story. I understand she mocks society, but in a very snobbish way. Because her melancholy is so superior. How those damsels in her story search for their Liberty and feminism, and all marriages are like cages, and every men is so either empty or cruel. And at the same time, how helpless they are! (Yawning). It for boring fast.