A Escrava Isaura 10.32 · 10.32

Álvaro rejects the cynical reading with the ardour that defines him: 'tudo nella respira candura e singeleza' — everything in her breathes candour and simplicity. And here the reader's usual irony reverses, for Álvaro is right. Isaura truly has no coquetry; the 'candura' he perceives is real, the transparent goodness the whole novel insists on. His idealizing eye, so often naive, sees more truly than his friend's worldly one — he reads Isaura's genuine innocence where the cynic sees only a woman's ploy. Guimarães quietly vindicates the idealist: love that assumes the best of its object is, in Isaura's case, simply accurate. The man who refuses to suspect her is the man who sees her most clearly.

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