From an infinite distance, I saw the floor. Ofélia. From afar, I tried to reach the heart of that silent girl, in vain. Oh, do not be so frightened! Sometimes people kill for love, but I promise you that one day you will forget everything, I promise you! People do not know how to love, do you hear me, I repeated as if I might reach her before, in refusing to serve truth, she should proudly serve nothingness. I who had not remembered to warn her that without fear there was the world. But I swear that this is breathing.

—Clarice Lispector, “The Foreign Legion”