An apprenticeship, or, The book of pleasures

Lispector's dense and singular romance (after The Besieged City), first published in Brazil in 1969, arrives in a rich new translation from Tobler and illuminating afterword by Sheila Heti. Lóri, a primary school teacher leading a solitary existence in Rio de Janeiro and unable to stomach her "bourgeois middle class" milieu, becomes captivated by the elusive Ulisses, a philosophy professor and self-described excellent teacher ("basically I like to hear myself talk about things that interest me," he explains). The two speak on the phone, meet for drinks, and visit a local swimming pool, but Ulisses tells Lóri she's not ready for the relationship he wants, a claim that drives the bulk of Lori's stream-of-consciousness analysis ("she was bound to him because she wanted to be desired"). Ulisses speaks often of his "apprenticeship" to something only aspired to--he's "in the middle" of it, he says, but Lóri feels he's "infinitely further along" than she is. The purpose of their apprenticeship is never expressed, though one of Lóri's goals is to feel "alive through pleasure" instead of pain, and Heti's revealing afterword leaves the reader with much to chew on. This deep immersion into the vicissitudes of love will delight Lispector devotees. (Apr.)

A love story--of sorts--by one of Brazil's finest writers. This slim but intense volume is known as one of Lispector's most accessible, or straightforward. If you're new to her oeuvre, that might strike you as something of a joke: There is very little--if anything--in this novel that is actually "straightforward." The plot, such as it is, involves a man and a woman--Lóri and the aptly named Ulisses--who love each other but can't be together. Anyway, not yet. First, Lóri has a journey of sorts to complete: "The way I want you to be mine," Ulisses tells her, "will only happen when you also want it the same way. And that will take time because you haven't discovered whatever you need to discover." So what does Lóri need to discover? The existentialists might have described it as a way to live authentically. Lispector writes: "The thing the human being aspires to most is to become a human being." The novel, then, traces the story of Lóri's becoming, which--with only a few exceptions--is an entirely inner journey. Those exceptions--an early morning swim, a few nights out for drinks with Ulisses, a cocktail party--don't give the reader all that much to go on. By far the greatest portion of the book is taken up with long, lyrical, philosophical passages, intermittently punctuated, that describe the subtle shifts in Lóri's thinking. These passages can feel overblown: "Had moments gone by or three thousand years? Moments according to the clock by which time is divided, three thousand years according to what Lóri felt when with heavy anguish, all dressed and made up, she reached the window." No doubt the novel is a crucial addition to Lispector's English-language body of work; still, it'll likely leave more than one reader yearning for something more earth-bound. Lyrical, ponderous, and dense, Lispector's latest also feels overblown. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.