Clarice Lispector’s Interviews with Brazilian Jewish Cultural Figures

Abstract

In her public life, Clarice Lispector fought to be recognized as a native Brazilian; however, in her private life, she tended to associate with people with origins like hers. Many of her interviews are with artists who were either children of immigrants or emigrants from Eastern Europe. Scholars have probed Clarice’s fiction and the interviews she gave for a view of her approach to Jewish identity, but the interviews she conducted have not yet been examined. This article discusses Clarice’s dalliance with identity politics when interviewing notable members of the cultural Brazilian Jewish community, analyzes the questions she asked, and examines how she guided the conversation.