Reading 1001 discussion

2017:
The author Machado de Assis is one of Brazil's great authors. His literary style is unique. This book, about 255 pages in length, has 148 chapters. The book starts out telling us how Bentinho Santiago has come to be known as Dom Casmurro, or as a reticent, tight lipped man of a noble nature. The the first person narrative, Dom Casmurro takes us back to his adolescent years and his friendship with the neighbor girl Capitú. His mother has promised that she will give her son to the service of God. Bento has other ideas after he discovers he loves the next door neighbor girl. It is a story of young love ruined by jealousy and we have Shakespeare's Othello as our example. The book starts with the old man looking back at his live that he has lived in Rio. We know he is alone with his servant and is writing his life's story out of boredom.

found this book a bit hard to get into, which is probably why I didn't finish it when it was a BOTM in 2017. Once I got past the first 50 pages or so, I was delighted with the detailed description of first love. I missed the meaning of Dom Casmurro as an old curmudgeon until I had finished and read some other reviews, but nevertheless enjoyed the story of a young man falling in love and asserting his independence. Then I began to appreciate the humour, the authorial asides and the realisation that the narrator was somewhat unreliable. It became more enjoyable to read the deeper into the story I got, until I was revelling in the whole experience. I now understand why Machado de Assis is considered one of the best Brazilian authors and how fresh and original the book must have seemed to those reading it when it was first published in 1899. It is also interesting that the fact that he was a descendent of slaves had been ignored until comparatively recently.

I gave this one 3 stars. The plot was fine but didn't really grab me. However, I was pretty amused by the dark humor riddled throughout the book. It has this sense of high melodrama about the mundane that I did find funny. One of the mini-chapters called "Sofa" was my favorite and it starts with the line: "of the furniture, only the sofa seems to have understood our situation, offering its services with such insistence that we accepted and sat down".

That is how I feel looking at my couch everyday lol.

Pre-2017 review:

**** 1/2

This is one of the great rewards of undertaking the task of reading our way through the List: discovering unexpected and fairly unknown pearls like this novel. Bentinho Santiago, nicknamed Dom Casmurro, proceeds to write his memoirs out of boredom, but also to disclose to some extent why he has received this nickname. It is a love story told by an unreliable narrator, partially blinded by jealousy. The ending is ambiguous and we can only guess what the truth was. I loved the wit exuding on many of the usually small chapters, the size of which provide an interesting reading pace. Quite original for the era and quite fitting the South American style of writing we encounter from Garcia Marquez, for example. Looking forward to reading Bras Cubas.