Clarice Lispector: “It Changes Nothing”

Clarice Lispector gave exactly one television interview in her entire life and — unsurprisingly — it is 22 minutes and 49 seconds of perfect. Apparently, the director of TV Cultura in São Paulo had gathered all his courage and simply asked her to appear, and she said yes.

The Paris Review posted the complete video here yesterday, saying:

Lispector is restless, and charmingly curt, throughout the interview — it seems as if she really, really doesn’t want to be there. Even under duress, though, she gives stronger, more meaningful answers than many writers give at their most accessible. “I write without the hope that what I write can change anything at all. It changes nothing…Because at the end of the day we’re not trying to change things. We’re trying to open up somehow.”

My personal favorite answer comes early in the interview when she’s asked what adolescent Clarice was like. Her response: “Chaotic. Intense. Entirely outside the reality of life.” Same, tbh.