Orlando, Virginia Wolf

Um maravilhoso livro de amor e "aventuras", ao qual fui levado não só pelo estatuto de clássico, mas por uma descrição atraente feita por Lia Gama de um dos episódios do livro: a primeira paixão de Orlando, que é por uma princesa Russa e que cresce e solidifica da mesma forma que o Tamisa gela e se "vai" da mesma forma que o Tamisa degela.

Entre as muitas passagens de que gostei deixo esta:

"he was a nobleman afflicted with a love of literature. Many people of his time, still more of his rank escaped the infection and were thus free to run and hide or make love at their own sweet will. (...) It was the fatal nature of this disease to substitute a phantom for reality, so that Orlando, to whom fortune had given every gift - plate, linen, houses, men-servants, carpets, beds in profussion - had only to open a book for the whole vast accumulation to turn to mist. The nine acres of stone which were his house vanished; one hundred and fifty indoor servants disappeared; his eighty riding horses became invisible; it would take too long to count the carpets, sofas, trappings, china, plate, cruets, chafing dishes and other movables often of beaten gold, which evaporated like so much sea mist under miasma. So it was, and Orlando would sit by himself, reading, a naked man."

Páginas 52, 53, Penguin Classics