ay in which Macabéa is brutally killed by a Mercedes at the end of ‘Hour of the Star’ highlights the psychological impact of modernity on the poor of Brazil’s Nordeste region and perhaps more widely the world. The ‘Mercedes’ can be read as a two layered metaphor for modernity. Firstly, the automobile is a representation of the modernisation of the 20th century and by a car killing Macabéa it represents how the modernisation process has smashed the poor and the forgotten to the curb and let the rich drive further away. The fact it is a Mercedes, a German brand, could be representative of the globalisation process and how that has also smashed aside the poor to allow the rich to get richer. The driver is also is also described as ‘blond and foreign’ (Lispector, 70) further elaborating the globalisation metaphor. In this sense the ending of ‘Pale Horse, Pale Rider’ is far more optimistic for the future with Miranda making some sort of peace with Adam and having the option to go back into and war and plague free world. However, she will always be marked by her experiences of the influenza epidemic. Miranda describes herself as being ‘not quite dead now’ and having ‘one foot in either world’ (Porter, 362), this again is a common reaction to a near death experience and would likely be felt by much of her readership as almost every person would’ve either served in the war or been close to the epidemic.

The representation of the two male love interests are very different in the two texts but the effect on the two female protagonists is similar. In Porter’s ‘Pale Horse, Pale Rider’ the character of Adam is portrayed to be honest and good towards Miranda. His character is also full of religious imagery; his name ‘Adam’ is of course the first human that God created and that all of humanity descends from. He is also presented as a pseudo-Messiah character as he cares for Miranda whilst wearing a ‘tunic’ and the fire is said to illuminate ‘him from the back’ (Porter, 347) resembling a halo. He also obviously sacrifices himself in caring for her. In her essay ‘The Pattern of Allusions in Clarice Lispector’, Lindstrom notes that Lispector’s ‘early contact with Jewish culture’ influenced her work with use of ‘Hebraic poems’ and ‘mysticism’ thus explaining the religious imagery. Interestingly the name Miranda is derived from the Latin ‘mirandus’ meaning wonderful or admirable. These are two qualities that the Miranda seems to have little self-identification with preferring t