Near to the Wildheart Paperback – 6 February 2014

As a first time reader of Clarice Lispector, I found it very difficult to understand where this book comes from. The book offers no context or insight about the author (at least for the Indian audience, who have no clue about Brazil's history, leave alone a writer who became famous only after she left Brazil). It painfully took me months to continue reading a book which only delves into the inner thoughts of the protagonist Joanna, with very little information on the background or the surroundings.I had to stop reading the book and figure out more about the writer, Brazilian literature, the Jews in the country and after going through many reviews I realised that I wasn't the only one to find this book difficult. It is said that the meaning was lost in the English translated text, so perhaps I am missing out on a lot of things.Brilliant book for those who'd like to go deep into introspection about morality, their own thoughts and the ones with existential crises.