Statue of Clarice Lispector

Clarice Lispector was not born in Rio de Janeiro—or even in Brazil. She came to Brazil as a baby, a refugee from Ukraine. She later became a naturalized Brazilian and developed a deep emotional bond with Rio, one that would decisively shape her writing. She was born in 1920 in Chechelnyk and was christened Haia Lispector. She and her family adopted Brazilian names upon their arrival in Brazil. She was raised in Maceió and Recife, moving to Rio in 1935. Over the course of her life, she lived in neighborhoods such as Flamengo, Jardim Botânico, Catete, Tijuca, and Copacabana. But it was in Leme that she found her forever home: “I belong in Leme now,” she once said.

She began life afresh between the ocean and the mountains after her separation and resumed her writing after many years without publishing. She lived in the neighborhood from 1959 to 1977, first in the Visconde de Pelotas building, on General Ribeiro da Costa Street, and later in the Macedo building, on Gustavo Sampaio Street. At times she would withdraw into solitude; at others she socialized with artists and friends who lived nearby. It was an uncomplicated routine—going to the beach, the Duque de Caxias bakery, the open-air market on Mondays and the restaurant La Fiorentina—an emotional landscape that she incorporated in her literature.

Clarice and Ulisses in Gustavo Sampaio’s apartment. 1970s. Photo: Archive-Museum of Brazilian Literature of the Rui Barbosa Foundation | Clarice Lispector Archive.

Clarice graduated with a degree in law and worked as a journalist, becoming a staff writer for the newspaper A Noite in 1942. But it was through her career as a writer that she gained recognition. She started writing at the age of 13, and at 23 won the Graça Aranha Prize for best novel of the year with Near to the Wild Heart. Clarice became one of the most original voices in the Portuguese language, known for her poetic style and for her exploration of existential themes, especially through female characters. Her most significant works include Family Ties (1960), winner of the Jabuti Prize, and The Hour of the Star (1977), her final novel. She died of cancer in 1977, but in a sense she lives on in the neighborhood she adopted as her own.

Since 2016, Clarice and her dog Ulisses — her inseparable companion in her final years—have been immortalized in bronze at the end of Leme Beach. The statue, the first life-size one in the city of Rio de Janeiro, was conceived by her biographer Teresa Monteiro and brought to completion thanks to the involvement of readers and admirers who funded the project by selling models and holding public campaigns. The statue was sculpted by Edgar Duvivier, who has created a number of pieces around the city, such as the bust of Lima Barreto on Lavradio Street, and the statue of Princess Isabel in Copacabana. The monument to Clarice Lispector bears a plaque with an excerpt from her essay ‘The Three Experiences’: “There are three things for which I was born and to which I have given my life. I was born to love others, I was born to write, and I was born to raise my children. To love others is so vast that it even encompasses forgiving myself, with whatever remains.”

photo: reproduction