The Red Word: a Dialogue Between Mariana Paiva and Hilda Hilst

Abstract

Vermelho-vida, a book by Mariana Paiva (2018) is founded on a dialogue with the work of Hilda Hilst. It begins with Paiva’s experience at Casa do Sol: Paiva’s book is a mix of diary, readings of Hilst and her own poetic creations. There is a straight interlocution with Júbilo, memória, noviciado da paixão (1974), the work in which Hilst emulates an adulterous and forbidden passion. One of Hilst’s epigraphs is by Sylvia Plath, often associated with confessional poetry. In our reading — based on Janet Malcolm’s and Diane Middlebrook’s comments —, the confessional mode is not so much based on the exposure of biographical information as it is on the blurring of the public and private spheres. Hilst, though different from the American confessionists, adopted similar strategies to encode the biographical as she provokes common sense from a personal sphere. In Vermelho-vida, Paiva presents her contact with Hilst. She reflects upon the deduction of intimacy and introduces herself as a writer. Thus, our reading focuses on this double portrait, both personal and political, social and intimate: we follow Paiva and Hilst, two women writers, in their insights on the link between poetry and life within this modern lyrical mode.