"Dom Casmurro" by Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis ****

> Brazilian author

> Summer Sub Club read with Beth

> Part of the Library of Latin America series

> Setting: Rio de Janeiro, 1857

> Basic Plot: Sebastian/Betinho's mother promised her son to the seminary before God, Betinho is in love with neighbor, Capitu and they swear to marry only each other....then Betinho is sent off to seminary, whilst plotting on how to avoid ordination to return to his love. Major players: Jose Dias (dependant on family, no relation, makes self necessary), Aunt Justina (says she is on Betinho's side, but will not atke action as she is dependent on his mother), Capitu (young, manipulative), Mother (afraid of defying oath to God, otherwise naive, a widow)

>Title.....someone called the narrator/protagonist "Dom Casmurro" once......self referrent by the author......commonly used to refer to someone who keeps to themselves and does not go out a lot....Machado was painfully shy .......p.4...."And with a little effort ,, since the title is his, he can think the whole work is. There are books that only owe that to their authors: some not even that much."

> Narrator's goal: "Clearly my aim was to tie the two ends of life together and bring back youth in old age........Everywhere, thought the surface may be the same, the character is different. If it was only ohters that were missing, all well and good: one gets over the loss of other people as best one can; but I myself am missing, and that lacuna is all-important....."

> p.3..."The friends I have left are all of recent date; all the older ones have gone to study geology in God's acre.".......LOL

> p.5..."Ah, come ye back once more, ye restless shades" - Faust.......Narrator hopes for this while writing memoir

> Assis has marvelous wit......."Uncle Cosme replied with a 'Hmmph', which translated into the vernacular; meant: 'This is all in Jose Dias' imagination; the youngsters are having fun I;m having fun. Where's the backgammon?"

> the "history of creation" a la Marcolini, a composer friend of the narrator...."God is poet. The music is by Satan, a young and very promising composer, who was trained in the heavenly conservatory......." p.18-20

> Vocabulary: 1) ciborium: a vessel used in the Christian Church to hold the eucharist or an arched canopy over an altar standing on four pillars 2) aspersoriam: the basin or vessel in the Roman Catholic Church used to hold holy water 3) panegyric: a speech or phrase in praise of someone

> p.63..."Undertow eyes? Why not? Undertow. That's the notion that the new expression put in my head. They held some kind of mysterious, active fluid, a force that dragged one in, like the undertow of a wave retreeating from the shore on stormy days."- Capitu's eyes

> p.67...."Columbus, when he discovered America, had no greater thrill. I hope that the banality of the comparison is made up for by its aptness: for it is true that in every adolescent ther is a hidden world, an admiral and an October sun." - Betinho's realization that "I am a man".

> p.93...."If I could count the tears I wept the day before and on the morning of my departure, they would add up to more than all those shed since Adam and Eve. This is somewhat and exaggeration; but it is good to be emphatic from time to time, to make up for this obsession with accuracy that plagues me." - wonderful

> p.105...."But, since I believe that sonnets exist ready made, like odes and dramas and other works of art, for such are the laws of metaphysics, I give these two lines to the first person with time on his hands who comes along. Some Sunday, if it's raining, out in the country, or at any moment of leisure, he can try and see if the sonnet comes out. The whole point is to provide it with an idea and fill the missing middle". opening line: "Oh, flower of heaven! Oh! flower chaste and pure!" The closing line: "Though life be lost, the battle still is won!" or "The battle may be lost, but life is won!" - which will be the ending of this story, I wonder

> Enter Escobar, Betinho's first confidante

> p.107..."I was not yet "Casmurro", nor "Dom Casmurro". Shyness prevented me being open, but since the doors had neither keys nor locks, all that was needed was to push them and Escobar pushed and entered. I found him inside, and here he stayed, until.....".......very mysterious....foreshadowing I would guess

> p.121....From which I conclude that one of the roles of man is to shut his eyes and keep them tight shutm to see if he can continue into the night of his old age the dream curtailed in the night of his youth."

> p.121..."The ancient dreams had been pensioned off, and the modern ones are inside people's brains. Even if the latter wanted to imitate the former, they would be unable to; the isle of dreams, like the isle of love, like all the islands in all the seas, is now the object of rivalry between Europe and the United States."

> p.127..."....there's nothing worse than giving the longest of legs to the shortest of ideas." - Wonderful!

> p.172..."Vanity is the beginning of corruption"

> Unusual pacing.......incredible detail and story from narrator's age of 17....then leaps and bounds to the future for the denouement......not an unexpected one

> Had to chuckle a bit at the way the characters died off in rapid fire succession near the end......


> LibraryThing Review: This is story written by a beloved Brazilian author which explores the classic themes of love, betrayal, and relationships. Machado de Assis has a lovely writing style and delightful wit. In an afterword his writing is described as "the pen of wit dipped in the ink of melancholy", which I found to be completely a propos. The reader goes through the idealism of youth with the narrator and leaps into the disillusionment of adulthood. There were also some philosophical notions I found really interesting, such as God being the poet and Satan being the musician for the composition we call life. I did not appreciate the sexism, but that is a given in literature of the period, so I can overlook it. The characters were engaging and, for me, they all shared the allure of "the undertow" attributed only to Capitu, the ingenue/femme fatale of the story. Ultimately it is a dramatic tale told really well. Strongly recommend it.