Dom Casmurro 3.28 · 3.28

and this is the difficulty

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e esta é a difficuldade,

and this is the difficulty,

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eiandestaES-tathiséehisaathedifficuldadedi-fi-kul-DA-djidifficulty,

The setting

He closes the loop: this nearness is the difficulty he warned of.

A note on this passage

The vague noun of the opening is finally cashed out: 'esta é a difficuldade' — this is the difficulty. José Dias has walked his listener the whole way from an abstract 'possible difficulty' to a named one, and the naming feels like arrival, like proof, though nothing has actually been proven — only two children playing in corners. The rhetorical trick is complete: a suspicion has acquired the shape and weight of a fact simply by being approached slowly enough.

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