Thanks for a great selection, Mary. Your opening post touched on both things I wanted to discuss.

Okay, the style. As I posted in the earlier thread, it was very hard for me to read the first page -- I kept rereading the run-on sentences, kept freaking out by the grammar. Then, suddenly, like a wooden roller coaster train connecting with the chain on the lift, it clicked and I was pulled up the hill and then released. Gravity worked from there, and it was actually super-easy to read after that.

And, of course, it's amazing how well the writing literally makes the reader blind. I'm not familiar with his other word: Is this how he always writes? If so, that might make me less enamored with the style, but like you said, it works perfectly here. His occasional switching of the point-of-view (from third person to first person plural to second person) also worked well to make whatever point he was making at that moment in the novel.

Clearly, this is an allegory -- and for so many things. However, I found myself occasionally wishing that the soldiers weren't such one-dimensional assholes or that the government wasn't portrayed as such an inhuman monolith, for example. I recognize that these institutions and people may very well act this way in real life, but in the book their reactions are totally predictable and almost trite.

But I forgive Saramago's lack of subtlety because, for one, on a page-by-page basis the story is incredibly detailed and perfectly crafted, and for two, it is fundamentally an allegory, and subtlety isn't required.

I also appreciated how the allegory works on a number of different levels: This story could stand in for AIDS, or terrorism, or war, or any other number of large-scale things that must be Dealt With.

As I read, I often found myself fearing blindness (I'd easily choose going deaf over going blind, if I were to have to make such a choice), and also getting angry at the what we've become as human beings. It's not hard at all to figure out why people -- especially those in the ward -- react and act the way they do, but that doesn't make it any more palatable.

Andy | June 23, 2003 8:45 AM

Hey, mary, interesting book. I finished it in one sitting.

I disagree with most of what's been said so far about its texture, though. For one, what we read was translated from Portuguese, so even if the translator was very careful to duplicate the author's style, we can't really know how well it would have worked in the original, or even how good a job the translator did.

(I have the same concerns about Umberto Eco, but the translations of his work have always "felt" natural to read, so I've been willing to let it ride.)

And I'm not sure Blindness' translation *was* all that good a job... There's a note at the end of the book that the translator died while the work was in progress, and I wonder if that might have affected the final result: the book is filled with archaisms (obsolete and oddly used language) and half-translated idioms that may in fact not mean what we as English speakers see in them. Artifacts, simply, of either bad translation or odd translating choices.

That said, there were a number of elements of good storytelling: struggle, nobility, evil, depravity, virtue, sacrifice... I cared what happened to the characters. It was a riveting story in many ways.

But I had a lot of trouble suspending my disbelief as to *why* people in the book acted the way they did. I'm simply not sure that's how blinded people, en masse, would act... How long does it take to adjust to the loss of one's sight? What compensations do the other senses give? What are the repercussions for balance, touch, smell, hearing? What about the hundred little injuries a day a blind person gets bumping into things, until she learns how to get it right?

The point's been made that the author was himself making a point about loss of dignity and the consequences of institutional and social blindness, but I'm afraid the story suffered as a result: the fact that the people couldn't see was really of secondary importance after the first half of the book; they were simply helpless and degraded after that point, and could have been merely uneducated, or oppressed. Perhaps that was his thrust of argument, but I'm not sure I buy it. That's a bit more subtle than I give him credit for.

And I think this is what bothered me most, suspension-of-disbelief-wise. Real people who go blind *adjust.* They retain their problem-solving capabilities, their cleverness, their moral structures; all they've lost is their sight. Some of the most creative and driven people I've met have been blind or nearly so, and while I can accept that a blindness plague would have been an immense social shock, I don't believe that it would have spelled the downfall of human civilization.

Rich | June 23, 2003 11:32 AM

There’s that damn word again: texture. Despite my efforts to steer terminology toward an actual literary term, craft, it goes right back to that damn word in one fell swoop. I think Rich is concerned about, in expressing his reservations about the translation, getting secondary "texture" rather than being able to read the source.

For those of us who don’t understand Portuguese, it is what it is. In addition to Blindness, I’ve also read All the Names and can confirm that the style of both books is very similar. Margaret Costa solely translated the latter while only finishing up the work on the former. Although it might be of academic interest to read the work of another translator, say The Stone Raft, I suspect you’ll be hit with much of the same language and structure.

In terms of the book being littered with archaisms, Rich, keep in mind that Saramago was beyond 70 when he wrote it. That, coupled with Portuguese being a flowery language (as are Spanish and French) makes me think the translators took care in being faithful to the original. In any case, it’s another reason to think about adding Portuguese to my language repertoire.

Andy makes a good point when he brings up the one-dimensionality of the soldiers. It would have been interesting to have a soldier go blind then be thrown into one of the wards with the internees. However, Saramago clearly distrusts the establishment and such a character would have thrown off his them against us theme. Going blind causes the characters to see, and I doubt Saramago could treat an instrument of the government as sympathetically as necessary. When everyone finally goes blind, control completely evaporates and the disappearance of the soldiers is a metaphor for the breakdown of social order.

Unlike Rich, I had no trouble suspending disbelief for this one. I know what he means, though, since I am a staunch realist and find many ridiculous situations in books, TV, and movies. In the case of Blindness, I realized the story was an allegory early on and did not loot at it with such a critical eye. I spent the majority of pages reading between the lines and wondered more about the message rather than the improbability of the plot.

Although I agree that the blind do adapt, I can imagine such chaos taking over in the wake of such an epidemic. Imagine it: everyone everywhere goes blind and many are out and about when it happens. They can’t even find their way home let alone keep public services such as water, telephones, and electricity intact. There’s no one to police the hoards of the lost roaming the streets. There’s also no one to help the blind adapt (except for our group of central characters) as we have in our sighted world today. The idea is truly horrifying.

marydell | June 23, 2003 8:33 PM

Never fear, Mary, I was able to finish the book before I went Potter-crazy! I really liked this book a lot!

I must admit though, it took me a good 100 or so pages to get used to the writing style. I am not a fan of run-on and endless sentences, but after I got used to it, I did not notice the style anymore and the story flowed. I admit I did not initially make the connection between the writing style and the physical impairment of blindness, but now that it was mentioned, a big light bulb went off in my brain and I feel stupid.

I think my biggest criticism is what Rich already mentioned. Having two aunts who are blind, I really did find some of the behavior in the book puzzling. Rich is correct when he states that blind people do cope andadapt. It just seemed like these people gave up or were hysterical. Yes, it is very overwhelming and depressing to lose one's sight, but most people do cope with it and eventually adapt their lifestyle. And I don't think being blind makes you lose your dignity, which I think was kind of illustrated in the book.

All in all, I really did like the book. I think the overall message of the book still comes across, even if I disagree with the way some of it was portrayed.

Mary Carmen | June 24, 2003 9:24 AM

Style: In addition to duplicating the cacophony (I actually know the meaning of the word) that would come out of panic and chaos, I found that it made me really pay attention. I couldn't skim, which I sometimes do. I don't know if that's by design or just a happy accident.

I was torn about the idea of such chaos coming out of the plague, and the predictions of the end of humanity -- we would adapt. It would be ugly for a while, but we would adapt. One thing I thought was interesting was that he sort of addressed this, by having the blind accountant in with the thugs. He had already learned to cope with his blindness, so he had an advantage over everyone else. He had been taught to adapt. Would everyone else end up seeking out previously blind people to teach them how to be blind?

Re: Allegory. At first, I was seeing it as very much an allegory of how we treat the unknown, the things that scare us, diseases like AIDS and SARS and such, and not so much as a "humanity is blind to the needs of each other" tale. So it pissed me off that you could see people go blind as they transgressed - The car thief, the infected ward that tried to repel the new arrivals. If you read it as a metaphor for AIDS.... what, they deserved it? They got what they had coming to them? They reaped what they had sown? I got over that when I started seeing it as a bigger picture, but it was tough going at first. Did anyone else have that reaction, or am I the only depressingly literal one among us?

Sarah | June 24, 2003 12:05 PM

There's been a few mentions so far of the message and/or allegory that Blindness presents. I have some faint ideas of what this might be, but could someone articulate exactly what they think it is?

So far I see a few potential messages:

* People are basically nasty. (What was the phrase? "Half meanness and half mistrust?" I don't have my copy with me right now.)

* We've blinded ourselves to one another, and by doing so we're dooming ourselves to degradation and self-destruction.

* Stripped of our ability to watch each other (and know we're being watched), we're nothing but animals.

Thoughts?

Rich | June 24, 2003 2:56 PM

Thanks for an interesting read, Mary. Although I did find the tenor of the book slightly depressing, I enjoyed the story. I also found the writing style in tune with the story, it certainly increased the impact of the blindness.

Sadly, I fear that this story is a plausible version of what would happen if an entire community plunged into "whiteness." While adaptation would occur to some degree, loss of central services such as water or power coupled with the challenge of performing basic functions such as hunting/gathering and cleansing would reduce us to almost animal existences. Blind people today adapt partially because society can easily assist them.

Think of the chaos that would occur if someone living in a major city, who was raised in that environment, suddenly did not have power, water, sewer, groceries, medicines, transportation, etc. Now add to that universal blindness. This is one reason why, for me, the book was depressing: it did a good job of pulling me into that world. If the blindness did not go away, I think you would see the population drop significantly as resources dwindled and things like illness, disease and wild animals took hold.

I do not believe most of the behavior we see in the book would be out of nastiness. I think most of it would come from fear and the desire to survive. It would take a very strong individual, a "sighted" individual, to rise above this survival existence.

So, were the group of men who took control of the asylum (except for the accountant) former soldiers?

I don't know, Rich, perhaps a theme could be: "Stripped of our sight, we start to really see one another."

Hunter | June 24, 2003 4:57 PM

Rich, if you go back to the top of the post and read Saramago’s comments on why he wrote Blindness, you’ll get a better idea about the message.

Hunter reinforces my point about the how chaos could take over if everyone on the planet suddenly went blind. It’s true that the blind adapt, but adaptation takes time and in our day most often comes with help from the sighted. Since the novel takes place over only a matter of months and the blindness goes away in the end, we’re not with the characters long enough to find out what would happen if they were to adapt. I also agree with Hunter that much of what happened didn’t occur out of nastiness. Fear and desperation over survival took hold first.

I doubt the men who took over the asylum were soldiers. I think they simply had two advantages over the internees in other wards: a) the leader had a gun and b) the already blind accountant was able make their organization easier. Regardless, their advantages weren’t able to help them in the end since the sighted woman cut their domination short.

Although a few characters go blind during transgressions against society, the vast majority of them are normal, law-abiding citizens. Aside from the car thief and the hooker, the rest include the first man and his wife, the doctor, the boy with the squint, the man with the eye patch, etc. Rather than the blind being exclusively evil-doers, I think Saramago was trying to show people doing whatever they normally would do when the plague struck them.

marydell | June 24, 2003 6:19 PM

I dunno, Mary -- I don't have the book in front of me, so I can't quote exactly, but I found it significant that he describes the influx of new detainees, the panic of the people who were just exposed but not blind, their effort to shove the new blind people away, and "At that moment, they all went blind."

Rich, I found the message to be "It's all too easy for us to fall into brutality, and it takes a huge effort of will to raise ourselves above that. That can only happen by treating each other with kindness and respect. It's hard, but it can be done."

I also found myself, at the beginning of the book, thinking "How could they (principally the government) do this to people who so obviously need their help? Wasn't there any outcry?" A little later on, I started wondering "Would I do any different than the individuals in the book?" Would I have been so crazed with fear that I would have tried to push people out? Would I have hoarded food? Would I have let myself fall? And I don't have an answer. I've never been tested, and I hope to god I never am.

Sarah | June 24, 2003 6:53 PM

Blind. The apprentice thought, "we are blind," and he sat down and wrote Blindness to remind those who might read it that we pervert reason when we humiliate life, that human dignity is insulted every day by the powerful of our world, that the universal lie has replaced the plural truths, that man stopped respecting himself when he lost the respect due to his fellow-creatures.

I've read his entire Nobel address, never fear, but what exactly does this say, Mary? It's a bit highfalutin' fer simple ol' me. It's clear enough that Saramago doesn't like authority figures or how people treat one another, but how is this borne out in the novel? Where's the humiliation that kicks off the plague? How is the insult of the military or the government responsible for the plague? Where does he show the loss of respect for the world's creatures that leads to the plague? We appear to have a thesis and a supposed praxis, but little evident connection between them.

And it's this sort of disconnect that bugs me: I'm not sure I agree with Hunter that one thesis of the book is that going blind, we finally see one another. We're seeing creatures. Words like "see," "watch," "look," "appear" and others are ubiquitous in our discourse whether or not we're discussing visual phenomena.

What you get when you arbitrarily strip sight away is necessarily NOT truly a whole person. You see a person differently - blindness is a catastrophic, life-changing occurrence, and I'd argue that a sighted person is not the same or any "truer" without it.

I'll buy that vision is essential to the functioning of the world as it exists, and that its loss would be a transformative event, but I don't buy that we're somehow more truly ourselves without it.

The boundaries of politeness and social distance that sight allows (even demands) that we erect, and which blindness strips away, are in fact part of us; humanity is at least as much about appearance, privacy and reserve as it is about transgression of boundaries, sharing of self and discovery of hidden truths.

Rich | June 24, 2003 6:59 PM

Sarah, I caught that bit about the shoving-away and the immediate, almost consequential blindness onset, but I took it more for a sort of situationally ironic justice. Sometime's shit's funny when it happens, sometimes tragic, and sometimes horribly unfair, but it always happens. ;-)

And I'll buy your interpretation of a message, Sarah, but IMO there's a lot in the book that seems extraneous to that. I could be picking nits.

And as for, "where was the hue and cry, and how could they do this to those who needed their help?", welcome to the world of the self-centered, fearful, yet rational animal. This part of the novel I believed entirely: given a terribly contagious disease, ill-understood, with extreme symptoms but no cure, isolation and sterilization of the sources of infection become the cure. The healthy take precedence over the afflicted.

Horrible, but necessary.

Rich | June 24, 2003 7:07 PM

Sarah, I don’t really think the infected internees were supposed to be seen as evil-doers. I think of them more as being afraid of succumbing to the plague. It isn’t unlike the not-as-widespread panic resulting from SARS: people wearing surgical masks or not eating in a certain Chinese restaurant as a result of rumors that the owner died of it.

Rounding up mass groups of people with little public outcry has already happened in our history. There were the Japanese interred in camps during WWII and the Jews during the Holocaust. Both of those examples came about from fear. Locking up the blind to prevent an epidemic is a plausible scenario.

Rich, perhaps you’re taking the details of the story too literally. It’s an allegory, after all, and you have to think about it in terms of figurative blindness. Saramago’s assumption is that humanity is already compromised. If see his point of view, being walked through cause and effect with your hand held every step of the way becomes irrelevant. You may not agree with him, but that’s not necessary for seeing the message.

marydell | June 24, 2003 8:35 PM

Reading Rich's and Hunter's posts, which, mentioned, respectively, the allegorical nature of the story and "see[ing] one another," the following occurred to me: What if the meaning is at once more obvious and more hidden?

Here's what prompted my thinking: What of the fact that they see white? It's obviously significant or he wouldn't mention it so often, and it's there, I think, more than just as a detail. So what is it? (Certainly not texture.)

Making the leap without much exposition because I only had four hours of sleep this morning and just drove for 13.5 hours: Could this be an allegory about ethnocentrism or racism?

Andy Dehnart | June 24, 2003 11:47 PM

Okay, well maybe it is my undergraduate degree speaking and I am fishing for some kind of connection, but I also read a commentary on certain historical events in thsi book. Most notably the Holocaust. I see the parallel with the rounding up masses of people, and the blind faith of the masses. I don't know if this is realted, but it made me think about it a lot this week.

Mary Carmen | June 25, 2003 8:44 AM

I know that such things have happened in our past, and still happen today -- that's why I had the uncomfortable "what if it were me?" in the back of my mind throughout the whole book. But maybe it's just he Quaker-educated idealist in me -- even in the darkest parts of our history, there have been people who have raised their voices. They may have been few, and they may have been ineffectual, and they may have been quickly crushed, but they were there.

In this book, that's represented by the ophthalmologist’s wife, the sole seeing person and the one altruist we meet. Was she really the only one? And is that why she remained sighted -- because she always considered the needs of others? And is that part even true? Was she never selfish? And is that even the point?

Sarah | June 25, 2003 11:02 AM

As regards allegory, a good allegory is one that's clear: allegories are created for the purpose of making a point (and as such they may be clever, but they're usually considered clumsy and heavy-handed as well), and so far the points we're trying to dig out of Saramago's choices in storytelling all seem fairly muddy. If you're an author, and you want a malady to be an allegory for something, it's pretty elementary that it's used to punish, or that its causality is at least unambiguous. Sarah may be getting somewhere with her conjecture about the doctor's wife and her (mainly) altruistic nature, but she does make a few selfish choices (remaining silent about her sightedness rather than speaking up, mainly), so it's hard to make that point.

This is also why I have a problem with the blindness plague being an allegory for racism or ethnocentrism: the plague's progress seems either entirely arbitrary or simply universal. No reason is given for the doctor's wife being immune, no reliable examples are given of behavior or proclivity changing the spread of the disease. If there's a point Saramago's making, then it applies to all of us, like original sin.

...At which point I ask, what's the relevance? If we're all guilty, then it's a problem that's part of us and thus effectively incurable, and worth lamenting, perhaps, but not complaining about. And then, there's no action or realization that makes the plague recede - it's arbitrary, and again universal.

So the author has subjected the fictional inhabitants of the planet to death, degradation, disease and depredation for... what? What did humanity learn? What did the allegory mean? Why did it come? Why did it go? What, I ask again, is the message?

Rich | June 25, 2003 12:37 PM

Rich, perhaps it might be time to just say, "I don’t get it," and move on to another book. The message is exactly what Saramago says it is.

Thank you, Mary Carmen, for confirming my connection to the Holocaust. I love it when we’re on the same wavelength.

I think of the white blindness as being a metaphor for illumination. They were blind before they went blind, and going blind causes them to see:

"Why did we become blind, I don’t know, perhaps one day we’ll find out, Do you want me to tell you what I think, Yes, do, I don’t think we did go blind, I think we are blind, Blind but seeing, Blind people who can see, but do not see."

marydell | June 25, 2003 10:08 PM

I am gonna keep going with my Holocaust comparison because this is what is really helping understand this book and helps put it into perspective.

I totally buy the whole "blind but seeing, blind people who can see, but do not see." This perfectly sums up my experience in Germany and Eastern Europe. I interviewed, as many before me did, people who lived in the proximity of concentration camps. Who saw the smoke stacks, saw the ashes, knew something was going on, but said and did nothing. The overwhelming attitude expressed at the time was indifference. Of course looking back, there is a profound sense of shame, and sadness for their inaction, but at the time, no one felt any different, and they knew people were being killed.

These were people who were blind, but could see, but did not see. They chose to see what they wanted to see and were blinded to the awful things that were happening in front of them.

I totally see the same thing happening in this book with the plague. I think the take home message, at least for me, is that even though I can see, I see what I want to see. I may choose not to look at the nasty aspects of life, and in that respect, I am just as blind as someone who has no vision.

Mary Carmen | June 26, 2003 9:05 AM

But do you think, in the end, the recovered blind people do see? Do you think there will be any difference? There will be horror at the carnage and chaos, and sadness at what they've all gone through -- but seeing? Understanding? I doubt it.

Think about it -- did genocide stop with the Holocaust? Did heroism become second nature after 9/11? Or did we all become complacent again, to varying degrees?

One of the great talents of humanity as a whole and people on an individual basis is denial. "I couldn't have done anything." "I did what I had to do." "That's horrible, but it doesn't really affect us." "Nothing I could do would make a difference." Or just seeing, and then forgetting.

If we didn't have denial, we'd go mad. There's too much horror in the world, and there is, quite literally, very little we as individuals can do. (I think we have the responsibility to do what we can, but again, that may be the Quaker indoctrination talking. Quakers are like that.)

Maybe that's how the one sighted woman survived in the end -- she realized she could only be responsible for so many people (I'm thinking specifically about not telling the ward she was sighted, and closing up the storeroom in the market she'd found.)

What do you think?

Sarah | June 26, 2003 12:15 PM

I note, mary, that you didn't in fact answer my question. Explicate what Saramago says, defend it. Relate it specifically to the book, assess it critically. I can't, and that's my problem.

Hiding behind "you don't get it" is too easy. I want to know why this guy got a Nobel when I, a reasonably intelligent person, think his allegory is full of holes, and have yet to be disproved. :-)

I think my point is that yes, there's lots to say about the choice to be blind to events, to the Holocaust outside our door, to the racism of segregated bathrooms, to the suffering of the downtrodden. I just don't see that Saramago's saying much of anything.

I'm a structuralist: if you're going to make a point, then make a point. Yes, people under duress are frequently horrible to one another. Guards of the asylum, thugs making people pay heavily for their food. Check. Okay, people frequently blind themselves to horror in the world around them. Hmm, the blindness plague is contagious, capricious, not really caused provably by any action. Sloppy connection, but perhaps useful as a thematic ingredient, sorta, check. Okay, people deprived of sight are helpless and more vulnerable to the malice of others. Sight is very important to human function. In the valley of the blind, the one-eyed man's king. Okay, lots of gnarly stuff goes down in the asylum. Check, sorta. What ties all these pieces together? What's the masterstroke of unification, the perfect execution of thematic cookery, that makes this a Literary Work as opposed to just some stuff this Portuguese guy wrote?

Is Saramago warning us? Punishing us in effigy? What's his thesis here? Are we blind, in danger of going blind, foolish in playing with blindness by ignoring the world? Is the blindness just a random calamity that S. chooses to hang his exposition of man's inhumanity to itself upon, and otherwise thematically insignificant? OTOH, is blindness so central to the thrust of the book that its presence and its effects on the characters make the points he wants it to? No. Neither option really works.

Feh. I want to like this book, but IMO it's possessed of several large flaws.

That said, Andy (to actually participate in some of the other discussion here), when I think of why white-blind instead of dark-blind, the word that comes to mind is whitewashed, which conveys a lot of what Sarah and Andy're getting at.

Rich | June 26, 2003 4:30 PM

Rich, my answer to your question was and is: The message is exactly what Saramago says it is. It’s not my fault if you don’t understand.

I think Mary Carmen’s Holocaust analogy is dead on and does a good job of explaining Saramago’s statement, "the universal lie has replaced the plural truths." We see what we want to see. Sarah also makes a good point in that there are too many horrors in the world to suffer them all, but maybe it’s enough to be aware of them and treat our fellow humans with as much decency as possible. This could be why the doctor’s wife chooses to be responsible for only so many people and why sight returns in the end.

In terms of wondering why Saramago won the Nobel, Rich, keep in mind that the prize is for a body of work rather than just one book. I haven’t read anything prior to Blindness and All the Names, but he certainly deserved it if his other books are on par with the above two.

Re: "if you're going to make a point, then make a point." Isn’t flatly making a point kind of not the point of allegory? Rather than proclaiming Blindness full of holes, it would be wiser to acknowledge that there is a message, that you don’t see it, and that it’s okay not to understand things. You’ve brought your reasonable intelligence to our attention before, but it takes a wise person to know his/her own limitations. Has it ever occurred to you that you might be blind? I know I am, and I am always humbled and awed by the things I don’t understand.

marydell | June 26, 2003 11:54 PM

Again, I'm tired and need to crash after traveling, but I couldn't go to sleep without posting responding to this from Rich (surprise!):

As regards allegory, a good allegory is one that's clear: allegories are created for the purpose of making a point (and as such they may be clever, but they're usually considered clumsy and heavy-handed as well), and so far the points we're trying to dig out of Saramago's choices in storytelling all seem fairly muddy.

Allegories don't have to be completely obvious, like 2x4s to the reader's temple. They can be "fairly muddy" or super-muddy or even impossible to figure out. I'd even suggest that an author can write an allegorical tale or an allegory and not really know him- or herself what it's actually about.

For proof, I bring up that quintessential reference book: the dictionary. From dictionary.com, allegory is:

1. The representation of abstract ideas or principles by characters, figures, or events in narrative, dramatic, or pictorial form.


2. A story, picture, or play employing such representation. John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress and Herman Melville's Moby Dick are allegories.

Notice there's no specification about the complexity of the representation in question. In the case of Blindness, I think the allegory is at once obvious and nearly inaccessible, and I think that's part of the point.

Andy Dehnart | June 27, 2003 12:00 AM

Sarah, I think your comments are also dead on. It hink it is true that denial is an essential human emotion preventing us from going crazy. I am a big believer in choosing one's battles. In my life I have met many people who suffer from extreme anger, frustration, and sadness due to the state of world events and what is going on in this and other countries. These are people who have a lot of compassion, but, IMHO, don't focus it on one thing that they can change. They are so concerned with everything around them that they make themselves miserable. I am a big believer in "think globally, act locally." I think it is the only way you can really feel like you are making a change without going crazy from guilt and sadness.

To carry the Holocaust theme one more step to put it in tune with Sarah's observation, I guess Oskar Schindler would be a good example, my own personal feelings about him aside, of someone who chose to help those that he could.

I think the big picture that I am taking from this book, is exactly what Sarah touched upon. We see what we want to see, and in the end, even if we see the ugly and try to change it, are these changes and these feelings permanent or do things go back to normal after the fact? I kind of get the feeling that is what Saramago wants us to ponder. The aftermath of Sept. 11th is a great example.

Mary Carmen | June 27, 2003 8:44 AM

Rather than proclaiming Blindness full of holes, it would be wiser to acknowledge that there is a message, that you don’t see it, and that it’s okay not to understand things. You’ve brought your reasonable intelligence to our attention before, but it takes a wise person to know his/her own limitations. Has it ever occurred to you that you might be blind? I know I am, and I am always humbled and awed by the things I don’t understand.

In other words, "It's probably too deep for you." Bleah. Cop out, cop out, cop out. It's my guess that nobody here understands it, and everyone but me's satisfied being humbled and awed by that.

Nope, to me an inability to understand means either A) a deficiency in my own equipment, which can happen or B) less-than-perfect clarity on the part of the messenger. I've already pointed out several things I consider to be problems with Blindness, but I seem to be alone in these assessments.

Evidently, then, I'm being blinded by Saramago's brilliance, so I'll bow out.

Everyone have a good weekend!

Rich | June 27, 2003 5:49 PM

It's the calm before the storm: Hundreds of kids and their parents have just arrived here, and classes begin tomorrow, but I have an all-to-brief respite and I desperately wanted to reply to some of the thoughtful comments I read in a half-comatose state a few days ago.

Sarah: Your original read of the book as blindness-as-a-result-of-negative action didn't occur to me, but that would be pretty damning. Except I think we had a number of innocents go blind soon enough to not really make it seem like a causal relationship.

Hunter, I'm not quite convinced that "fear and the desire to survive" are enough of a justification for the behavior we witnessed (which Mary also discussed). Blindness left them reduced to a very animal state, and it wasn't pretty. As humans we (ideally) continually work to transcend that nature, and we need to try to be as true to our selves and to our fellow humans despite the circumstances, and not be blinded (!) by such fear.

Thus, I agree with Sarah's interpretation -- which echoes Saramago's statement about why he wrote the novel. And I like Mary Carmen's Holocaust read, but I think that the allegory is sufficiently broad as to include all sorts of actual events and circumstances that mirror the events in the book to some degree, including the Holocaust.

That the novel works on so many levels while being so clear and readable and digestible is, I think, definitely a testament to Saramago's ability.

Andy Dehnart | June 29, 2003 12:46 PM

Ok - I think I will be the last person to comment on this book. I thoroughly enjoyed the story. The idea of worldwide blindness is, in my opinion, quite horrifying. I think the book was very well written. The lack of proper punctuation, not quite knowing who was speaking just added to the intensity of the plot.
Mary - thank you for choosing this book. I will be sure to look for Saramago's other books.

Kate | June 30, 2003 3:51 PM

I see the Blindness as being infectious rather than the result of a negative action (Sarah) or capricious (Rich). The order in which the characters go blind is sort of like a chain reaction: the first blind man, the car thief, the doctor, the girl with the dark glasses, etc. It kind of reminds me about how a rumor gets started. First it originates with one person then begins to spread. Perhaps this is Saramago’s way of representing how "the universal lie has replaced the plural truths."

Kate, I don’t think anyone can be the last person to discuss Blindness. Although the thread will eventually fall off the home page, we’ll never have the last word on it. Our discussion has been pretty in-depth but we’ve only scratched the surface of the book. The list of things I want to talk about is nearly endless.

One of the things I didn’t bring up earlier as we tried to figure out the message, was looking more closely at the language Saramago’s uses. The entire book is littered with little figurative gems like: "There’s likely to be a battle, a war, The blind are always at war, always have been at war."

marydell | June 30, 2003 9:15 PM