1998's Nobel Prize winner for Literature, José Saramoga, has, with his astonishing and superb story Blindness, written one of the finest European novels of the last 20 or 30 years. Portugal's best-known writer--but like many Nobel winners hardly a household name in the UK--Saramoga has created a formidable and beautiful body of work deserving (and receiving) the very highest recognition. From the sublime, humanistic The Gospel According to Jesus Christ to the intelligent, metaphysical The Cave, Saramoga challenges, warns, argues but also entertains and enlivens through the truth of his transcendent and highly cultured fictions.

Suddenly, while stopped at a red light in his car, a man goes blind. A "white evil" obliterates his vision plunging him into light as fathomless and impenetrable as the darkest night. A crowd gathers and one man is kind enough to see him home. It is not long, however, before an epidemic of the new blindness causes the government to act in the most authoritarian and fearful of ways, throwing many of the recently disabled into a mental asylum, guarded by scared, trigger-happy soldiers, left to fend for themselves.

While Lord of the Flies might seem an immediately similar reference, Saramaga's work has both more craft and more acuity than William Golding's tale. Blindness is a luminous piece and a wonderful starting point for readers seeking a scrupulous and wise guide to these injudicious and myopic times. --Mark ThwaiteIn an unnamed city in an unnamed country, a man sitting in his car waiting for a traffic light to change is suddenly struck blind. But instead of being plunged into darkness, this man sees everything white, as if he "were caught in a mist or had fallen into a milky sea." A Good Samaritan offers to drive him home (and later steals his car); his wife takes him by taxi to a nearby eye clinic where they are ushered past other patients into the doctor's office. Within a day the man's wife, the taxi driver, the doctor and his patients, and the car thief have all succumbed to blindness. As the epidemic spreads, the government panics and begins quarantining victims in an abandoned mental asylum--guarded by soldiers with orders to shoot anyone who tries to escape. So begins Portuguese author José Saramago's gripping story of humanity under siege, written with a dearth of paragraphs, limited punctuation, and embedded dialogue minus either quotation marks or attribution. At first this may seem challenging, but the style actually contributes to the narrative's building tension, and to the reader's involvement.

In this community of blind people there is still one set of functioning eyes: the doctor's wife has affected blindness in order to accompany her husband to the asylum. As the number of victims grows and the asylum becomes overcrowded, systems begin to break down: toilets back up, food deliveries become sporadic; there is no medical treatment for the sick and no proper way to bury the dead. Inevitably, social conventions begin to crumble as well, with one group of blind inmates taking control of the dwindling food supply and using it to exploit the others. Through it all, the doctor's wife does her best to protect her little band of blind charges, eventually leading them out of the hospital and back into the horribly changed landscape of the city.

Blindness is in many ways a horrific novel, detailing as it does the total breakdown in society that follows upon this most unnatural disaster. Saramago takes his characters to the very edge of humanity and then pushes them over the precipice. His people learn to live in inexpressible filth, they commit acts of both unspeakable violence and amazing generosity that would have been unimaginable to them before the tragedy. The very structure of society itself alters to suit the circumstances as once-civilized, urban dwellers become ragged nomads traveling by touch from building to building in search of food. The devil is in the details, and Saramago has imagined for us in all its devastation a hell where those who went blind in the streets can never find their homes again, where people are reduced to eating chickens raw and packs of dogs roam the excrement-covered sidewalks scavenging from corpses.

And yet in the midst of all this horror Saramago has written passages of unsurpassed beauty. Upon being told she is beautiful by three of her charges, women who have never seen her, "the doctor's wife is reduced to tears because of a personal pronoun, an adverb, a verb, an adjective, mere grammatical categories, mere labels, just like the two women, the others, indefinite pronouns, they too are crying, they embrace the woman of the whole sentence, three graces beneath the falling rain." In this one woman Saramago has created an enduring, fully developed character who serves both as the eyes and ears of the reader and as the conscience of the race. And in Blindness he has written a profound, ultimately transcendent meditation on what it means to be human. --Alix Wilber

Survival can turn us all into barbarians, 18 Nov 2008
What a book! When an epidemic of sudden blindness happens, the blind and those contaminated by them are quarantined in an old asylum where they are left to fend for themselves. This situation rapidly changes from quarantine into imprisonment and squalor as the blind fumble about - they befoul the corridors as they can't find the toilets, people get injured and die from infection. The army don't deliver enough food and everyone gets gaunt and hungry. When an armed gang of blind men take over the food distribution demanding first valuables and then women in payment, you are truly horrified where before you were revolted by the conditions. I can honestly say it makes you feel dirty.

But there is one person in the asylum who can see - the eye doctor's wife - rather than leave her husband she pretends to be blind, and secretly and subtly tries to help the others around her without giving her secret away. It is through her eyes that we see everything that is going on - and it is a huge burden for her which she bears with grace and dignity.

Eventually the armed gang is overcome, and the internees realise the army outside is gone too and they escape to find a world which has rapidly become a barbarian place as the entire population is now blind. Bodies litter the streets, everyone is searching for food, there is no clean water, dogs and rats scavenge everywhere.

Later there are some marvellous scenes which relieve you temporarily from this grim vision - the cleansing powers of a shower of rain and the friendly dog who licks the tears away. An astonishing and powerful book and powerful commentary on the denial and removal of basic human rights. It was easy to read, although Saramago's largely punctuationless style takes a while to get used to. It is one that will stay with me for a long time.

thought provoking and original , 30 Oct 2008
I was blown away by this book. The whole thing seems like a religious allegory for the selfish modern age. Equally the plot devise of mass population blindness can also be read as the imposing of martial law on a capitalist free state. What really kept me reading though was the writing. The story deals with blindness in a frank way that doesn't shy away from exposing the worst aspects of human nature when it comes to survival in a lawless environment. The character of the doctors wife in intriguing and the symbolism inherent in her characters actions becomes increasingly apparent towards the end of the book. Read it now before the less successful film comes out,

I just don't see it., 04 Oct 2008
This a good book, I just don't think it's as good as other people do. The title and the subject matter suggest a profound work and this really isn't.

The story is fairly engrossing, the characters well executed, but any intelligent insight is vague and suggestive but never conclusive. This 'blindness' doesn't work as the metaphor I suspect it is being intended as, and as such this is simply a 300 page novel about people being unable to see. Which is fairly interesting I suppose, but it say's little new about humanity facing certain challanges and drags on in the middle.

I've not read any of his other works, and I will at somepoint, but this doesn't justify the hype - I just don't see it.

Frightening, but compelling..., 22 Aug 2008
Now on the cusp of a forthcoming film adaptation, which should hopefully bring it some much deserved extra attention, Jose Saramago's extremely provoking book "Blindness" is a wonderfully evocative, frequently disturbing read.

The premise is straight forward; an unexplained disease of sudden blindness plagues a (purposefully) unnamed city. The consequences are predictably devastating.

The key to your final interpretation of this book rests with how you adapt to Saramago's unusual style. This is a book built almost of a series of long paragraphs, practically uninterrupted by normal punctuation. Characters have whole conversations without quotation marks - and it's occasionally quite easy to get lost as to who is speaking to who. The overall effect is dizzying, complex, but quite brilliant. It's an immediate jolt that tells you this is something quite unique. Perhaps it's not the best comparison, but it's akin to when I read my first Cormac McCarthy novel. Something about how it's written just doesn't feel quite right at first.

Stick with it though and you're richly rewarded by a brutal story and frightening imagery that fully deserve your attention. This is a very impressive book.

5 stars is not enough, 27 Jul 2008
This book is amazing, incredible, breathtaking. It was recommended to me and once I started it 2 days ago I have barely been able to put it down. This book has just earned a place in my top 5 ever books and deservedly so.

The story starts with a man in his car at traffic lights who goes suddenly blind. He is helped home by a stranger, who a few hours later also goes blind. Within a few days the blindness has spread round half the city and also those afflicted are herded up by the government into a disused mental assylum and left alone. The wards quickly become overrun with filth and chaos ensues. In the middle of this, though, we get to know a handful of characters very well and it is really their story that we follow through the neverending days, lack of food and riots. The whole story is told through long paragraphs of uunbroken text. There are no quotation marks, hardly any punctuation and none of the characters are given names.

I admit to being concerned that I would find it difficult to overcome the lack of punctuation, but for commas and fullstops, and the lack of names (characters are referred to in such ways as the girl with dark glasses, the boy with the squint etc) but not only was it very easy to get used to this it actually added to the story. Also, although the characters don't have names, I found myself identifying with and caring about these characters far more than I have done in other books as Saramago writing drags you in and you find yourself unable to let go. It's as though I was "there". Genius!

If you read nothing else this year, make it this. It is astounding and I only wish I could award more than 5 stars.

Survival can turn us all into barbarians, 18 Nov 2008
What a book! When an epidemic of sudden blindness happens, the blind and those contaminated by them are quarantined in an old asylum where they are left to fend for themselves. This situation rapidly changes from quarantine into imprisonment and squalor as the blind fumble about - they befoul the corridors as they can't find the toilets, people get injured and die from infection. The army don't deliver enough food and everyone gets gaunt and hungry. When an armed gang of blind men take over the food distribution demanding first valuables and then women in payment, you are truly horrified where before you were revolted by the conditions. I can honestly say it makes you feel dirty.

But there is one person in the asylum who can see - the eye doctor's wife - rather than leave her husband she pretends to be blind, and secretly and subtly tries to help the others around her without giving her secret away. It is through her eyes that we see everything that is going on - and it is a huge burden for her which she bears with grace and dignity.

Eventually the armed gang is overcome, and the internees realise the army outside is gone too and they escape to find a world which has rapidly become a barbarian place as the entire population is now blind. Bodies litter the streets, everyone is searching for food, there is no clean water, dogs and rats scavenge everywhere.

Later there are some marvellous scenes which relieve you temporarily from this grim vision - the cleansing powers of a shower of rain and the friendly dog who licks the tears away. An astonishing and powerful book and powerful commentary on the denial and removal of basic human rights. It was easy to read, although Saramago's largely punctuationless style takes a while to get used to. It is one that will stay with me for a long time.

thought provoking and original , 30 Oct 2008
I was blown away by this book. The whole thing seems like a religious allegory for the selfish modern age. Equally the plot devise of mass population blindness can also be read as the imposing of martial law on a capitalist free state. What really kept me reading though was the writing. The story deals with blindness in a frank way that doesn't shy away from exposing the worst aspects of human nature when it comes to survival in a lawless environment. The character of the doctors wife in intriguing and the symbolism inherent in her characters actions becomes increasingly apparent towards the end of the book. Read it now before the less successful film comes out,

I just don't see it., 04 Oct 2008
This a good book, I just don't think it's as good as other people do. The title and the subject matter suggest a profound work and this really isn't.

The story is fairly engrossing, the characters well executed, but any intelligent insight is vague and suggestive but never conclusive. This 'blindness' doesn't work as the metaphor I suspect it is being intended as, and as such this is simply a 300 page novel about people being unable to see. Which is fairly interesting I suppose, but it say's little new about humanity facing certain challanges and drags on in the middle.

I've not read any of his other works, and I will at somepoint, but this doesn't justify the hype - I just don't see it.

Frightening, but compelling..., 22 Aug 2008
Now on the cusp of a forthcoming film adaptation, which should hopefully bring it some much deserved extra attention, Jose Saramago's extremely provoking book "Blindness" is a wonderfully evocative, frequently disturbing read.

The premise is straight forward; an unexplained disease of sudden blindness plagues a (purposefully) unnamed city. The consequences are predictably devastating.

The key to your final interpretation of this book rests with how you adapt to Saramago's unusual style. This is a book built almost of a series of long paragraphs, practically uninterrupted by normal punctuation. Characters have whole conversations without quotation marks - and it's occasionally quite easy to get lost as to who is speaking to who. The overall effect is dizzying, complex, but quite brilliant. It's an immediate jolt that tells you this is something quite unique. Perhaps it's not the best comparison, but it's akin to when I read my first Cormac McCarthy novel. Something about how it's written just doesn't feel quite right at first.

Stick with it though and you're richly rewarded by a brutal story and frightening imagery that fully deserve your attention. This is a very impressive book.

5 stars is not enough, 27 Jul 2008
This book is amazing, incredible, breathtaking. It was recommended to me and once I started it 2 days ago I have barely been able to put it down. This book has just earned a place in my top 5 ever books and deservedly so.

The story starts with a man in his car at traffic lights who goes suddenly blind. He is helped home by a stranger, who a few hours later also goes blind. Within a few days the blindness has spread round half the city and also those afflicted are herded up by the government into a disused mental assylum and left alone. The wards quickly become overrun with filth and chaos ensues. In the middle of this, though, we get to know a handful of characters very well and it is really their story that we follow through the neverending days, lack of food and riots. The whole story is told through long paragraphs of uunbroken text. There are no quotation marks, hardly any punctuation and none of the characters are given names.

I admit to being concerned that I would find it difficult to overcome the lack of punctuation, but for commas and fullstops, and the lack of names (characters are referred to in such ways as the girl with dark glasses, the boy with the squint etc) but not only was it very easy to get used to this it actually added to the story. Also, although the characters don't have names, I found myself identifying with and caring about these characters far more than I have done in other books as Saramago writing drags you in and you find yourself unable to let go. It's as though I was "there". Genius!

If you read nothing else this year, make it this. It is astounding and I only wish I could award more than 5 stars.


Homage to fascism, more like, 26 Mar 2008
Note how the great Orwell never says anything positive about those doing the bulk of the fighting against Franco - in fact, note how he barely mentions Franco and fascism at all! In the course of the events he descibes in this book, he spends most of his time doing nothing, like the rest of his Trotskyist and anarchist friends. Meanwhile, the Republicans, whom he slanders from afar, were fighting and dying in the front line against the Nazi and Italian forces who enabled Franco's victory. Note also how he never says a positive word about the Soviet Union, which was the only country to help the Republic, while the British and French governments helped Hitler and Mussolini to intervene.

Homage to freedom and equality, 19 Mar 2008
The Spanish civil war is possibly, alongside the Paris Commune of 1871, the period of history I wished to have taken an active part in. George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia is the best portrayal I've read so far on this period and an inspired and inspiring piece of literature. A very personal account of the war that doesn't neglect the social and political background, its implications and the influence it had on 20th century history. Ever wondered why the Spanish Civil war meant so much to so many around the world? Think you know what it really stood for? Ever questioned why the leftists (socialists, communists and anarchists) lost? Then this is the book for you.

Famous first-hand account of Spain's 1936-7 Civil War, 24 Feb 2008
A recent trip to Barcelona made me pull this book off my bookshelf, where it had been gathering dust since I first read it as a teenager 12 years ago. At the time I was very much into Orwell - his socialism, his hatred of Capitalism and his championing of the working classes. Though writing half a century earlier, he seemed to voice much of what myself and the other youths I hung around with believed.

Out of all Orwell's books that I read, I found this the least enjoyable and the most hard-going. I couldn't make head nor tail of who the different sides were, who was fighting who, what each side was fighting for and the complicated party politics of a Spain that existed nearly 60 years in the past.

The book is akin to Down and Out in Paris and London in that Orwell throws himself into an impoverished and dangerous situation which is not necessary for one of his social class and talents. Yet he does it anyway, mainly, I think, to provide the raw experience from which he can create these masterful literary accounts. In Paris and London Orwell writes about poverty and homelessness. Here he is writing about a war which, at first at least, he sees as being between 'the Fascists' and 'the working classes' (a perfect Orwellian subject). In the earlier book Orwell becomes a tramp. Here he becomes a soldier - a militiaman in a foreign army. Strange and noble that he should suffer so much for his art. However, 12 years on from my first reading, I can't help viewing Orwell's behaviour as a slightly patronising kind of 'social tourism'. When he has had enough, Orwell is able to, and in fact does, escape back to a comfortable middle-class existence back in England. This escape clause is not open to the real tramps, 'peasants' and militiamen he mixes with. This is not a severe criticism, though. Undoubtedly Orwell did genuinely care about the social injustices he witnessed and he was clearly trying to draw attention to them and strive for reform (he was instrumental in setting up the NHS in the 1940s).

This time I understood little more of what was going on than first time round. However, despite my lack of understanding, and despite having a markedly different political stance than I did as a teenager, I found the book to be much more rewarding this time round. Orwell's matter-of-fact reportage of trench warfare and street fighting is fascinating. His vivid descriptions of the antiquated weapons, attacking an enemy position, the freezing nights and the human lice - not to mention of getting shot through the throat ("The whole experience of being hit by a bullet is very interesting and I think it is worth describing in detail") - are vivid and eloquent. Also, you can see here embryonic elements that made it into Nineteen Eighty-Four (the systematic suppression and even murder of those that disagree with the state view, for instance).

This time round I was gripped all the way to the last sentence, by which time Orwell has returned home and finds England "sleeping the deep deep sleep of England, from which I sometimes fear we shall never wake till we are jerked out of it by the roar of bombs." Chilling when you reflect that this book was published in 1938, only a year before WW2 broke out.

A brilliant book, author and anarchist, 20 Oct 2007
Orwell has been slandered slightly with the title of socialist. This book well and truly shows his colours - multicoloured of course. The book is an outstanding account and description of the Spanish Civil War, an excellent portrayal of effective anarchism in action in Barcelona in those early days, a brilliant advertisement for pacifism, and an excellent insight into the mind of someone whose lasting influnce in the world has even changed the language. Thought police, Big Brother, Room 101 - all terms inspired by true events outlined in this classic book. There's memorable glimpses into the horrors of life in war - the food shortages, rats, the seemingly-trivial issues of looking for firewood, the lack of actual fighting, but the fun and camaradery too.

There's so much in this little book - masculinity, class, war, socialism, anarchism and descriptions of the Ramblas in Barcelona that have stood the test of time.

Simply Brilliant , 06 Dec 2006
This book is truly essential reading for anyone interested in the Spanish Civil War, or for that matter anyone with an interest in war, Communism, Socialism, Anarchism or in Literature. Orwell's account of the Spanish Civil War is more than just a brilliant account of life in a civil war, it is a first hand account of the horrors of Stalinism, and Orwell's experiences in Spain explain why he later wrote his best known works, 1984 and Animal Farm, to warn of the dangers which he knew so well.

The book starts out recounting Orwell's experiences of arriving in Spain as an eager volunteer wanting to help fight Fascism. He is shocked to discover the disorganisation and inefficiency of the Republican militias. The book then goes on to give a telling account of the boredom of trench warfare, where the naïve Orwell wants to be able to kill at least one Fascist to do his part in the struggle for freedom, but ends up mainly having to contend with lice, rats and the freezing weather.

This alone might make for an interesting read, but the book really comes into its own in the latter chapters, where Orwell describes the struggle going on within the Republican controlled region of Spain. A wounded Orwell returns to Barcelona, where the Stalinists who have seized control of the government turn on their political rivals. Orwell is well placed to describe the May fighting between the Stalinist police who wish to enforce state control and the idealistic anarchists who want to defend their revolutionary gains.

Following the government victory, Orwell's small political party the POUM is made a scapegoat for the fighting and is outlawed. A stunned Orwell is forced to go on the run from the very Republic for which he had been so willing to risk his life. This makes for a damning indictment of totalitarianism that is still capable of gripping and infuriating the reader generations after the events described. Orwell shows that he is one of the finest writers in the English language, and this is probably his finest work, deserving to be read by all.

Paulo Coelho's astonishingly beautiful writing in Eleven Minutes virtually guarantees it the cult status that The Alchemist already enjoys. But what is the Paulo Coelho phenomenon? How can an author who (only a short time ago) was virtually unknown to most readers have taken the world of books by storm--and without the benefit of glitzy advertising? The answer is simple: quality. Such books as The Fifth Mountain andThe Devil and Miss Prym are enough to explain a considerable following for the author, with their atmospheric prose and involving characters.

Eleven Minutes tells the story of young Maria living an innocent life in a Brazilian village and is played out in a measured fashion, but with all the author's brilliant scene-setting (very lush here) fully in place. But then Maria experiences love and suffers great pain. From this point, Coelho has us inexorably in his grip. Maria's disillusionment with love leads her to Geneva where she finally ends up selling her body (Coelho may offer us the beauty of life, but never at the expense of its harshness). Maria's approach to sex is complex--this is no mere revulsion arising from what she is now doing with her life. And then she meets a seductive young painter, who may or may not offer her a new path in life. But does she prefer to continue on the dark sexual odyssey she has embarked on, at the expense of real love?

There are echoes of DH Lawrence in Coelho's exploration of the sacred and spiritual aspects of sex and it's a brave author who tackles a subject that can so easily slip into strained seriousness. That never happens here, and Maria's journey is one that the reader willingly undertakes; the lesson she learns are lessons for the reader. --Barry Forshaw

Survival can turn us all into barbarians, 18 Nov 2008
What a book! When an epidemic of sudden blindness happens, the blind and those contaminated by them are quarantined in an old asylum where they are left to fend for themselves. This situation rapidly changes from quarantine into imprisonment and squalor as the blind fumble about - they befoul the corridors as they can't find the toilets, people get injured and die from infection. The army don't deliver enough food and everyone gets gaunt and hungry. When an armed gang of blind men take over the food distribution demanding first valuables and then women in payment, you are truly horrified where before you were revolted by the conditions. I can honestly say it makes you feel dirty.

But there is one person in the asylum who can see - the eye doctor's wife - rather than leave her husband she pretends to be blind, and secretly and subtly tries to help the others around her without giving her secret away. It is through her eyes that we see everything that is going on - and it is a huge burden for her which she bears with grace and dignity.

Eventually the armed gang is overcome, and the internees realise the army outside is gone too and they escape to find a world which has rapidly become a barbarian place as the entire population is now blind. Bodies litter the streets, everyone is searching for food, there is no clean water, dogs and rats scavenge everywhere.

Later there are some marvellous scenes which relieve you temporarily from this grim vision - the cleansing powers of a shower of rain and the friendly dog who licks the tears away. An astonishing and powerful book and powerful commentary on the denial and removal of basic human rights. It was easy to read, although Saramago's largely punctuationless style takes a while to get used to. It is one that will stay with me for a long time.

thought provoking and original , 30 Oct 2008
I was blown away by this book. The whole thing seems like a religious allegory for the selfish modern age. Equally the plot devise of mass population blindness can also be read as the imposing of martial law on a capitalist free state. What really kept me reading though was the writing. The story deals with blindness in a frank way that doesn't shy away from exposing the worst aspects of human nature when it comes to survival in a lawless environment. The character of the doctors wife in intriguing and the symbolism inherent in her characters actions becomes increasingly apparent towards the end of the book. Read it now before the less successful film comes out,

I just don't see it., 04 Oct 2008
This a good book, I just don't think it's as good as other people do. The title and the subject matter suggest a profound work and this really isn't.

The story is fairly engrossing, the characters well executed, but any intelligent insight is vague and suggestive but never conclusive. This 'blindness' doesn't work as the metaphor I suspect it is being intended as, and as such this is simply a 300 page novel about people being unable to see. Which is fairly interesting I suppose, but it say's little new about humanity facing certain challanges and drags on in the middle.

I've not read any of his other works, and I will at somepoint, but this doesn't justify the hype - I just don't see it.

Frightening, but compelling..., 22 Aug 2008
Now on the cusp of a forthcoming film adaptation, which should hopefully bring it some much deserved extra attention, Jose Saramago's extremely provoking book "Blindness" is a wonderfully evocative, frequently disturbing read.

The premise is straight forward; an unexplained disease of sudden blindness plagues a (purposefully) unnamed city. The consequences are predictably devastating.

The key to your final interpretation of this book rests with how you adapt to Saramago's unusual style. This is a book built almost of a series of long paragraphs, practically uninterrupted by normal punctuation. Characters have whole conversations without quotation marks - and it's occasionally quite easy to get lost as to who is speaking to who. The overall effect is dizzying, complex, but quite brilliant. It's an immediate jolt that tells you this is something quite unique. Perhaps it's not the best comparison, but it's akin to when I read my first Cormac McCarthy novel. Something about how it's written just doesn't feel quite right at first.

Stick with it though and you're richly rewarded by a brutal story and frightening imagery that fully deserve your attention. This is a very impressive book.

5 stars is not enough, 27 Jul 2008
This book is amazing, incredible, breathtaking. It was recommended to me and once I started it 2 days ago I have barely been able to put it down. This book has just earned a place in my top 5 ever books and deservedly so.

The story starts with a man in his car at traffic lights who goes suddenly blind. He is helped home by a stranger, who a few hours later also goes blind. Within a few days the blindness has spread round half the city and also those afflicted are herded up by the government into a disused mental assylum and left alone. The wards quickly become overrun with filth and chaos ensues. In the middle of this, though, we get to know a handful of characters very well and it is really their story that we follow through the neverending days, lack of food and riots. The whole story is told through long paragraphs of uunbroken text. There are no quotation marks, hardly any punctuation and none of the characters are given names.

I admit to being concerned that I would find it difficult to overcome the lack of punctuation, but for commas and fullstops, and the lack of names (characters are referred to in such ways as the girl with dark glasses, the boy with the squint etc) but not only was it very easy to get used to this it actually added to the story. Also, although the characters don't have names, I found myself identifying with and caring about these characters far more than I have done in other books as Saramago writing drags you in and you find yourself unable to let go. It's as though I was "there". Genius!

If you read nothing else this year, make it this. It is astounding and I only wish I could award more than 5 stars.


Homage to fascism, more like, 26 Mar 2008
Note how the great Orwell never says anything positive about those doing the bulk of the fighting against Franco - in fact, note how he barely mentions Franco and fascism at all! In the course of the events he descibes in this book, he spends most of his time doing nothing, like the rest of his Trotskyist and anarchist friends. Meanwhile, the Republicans, whom he slanders from afar, were fighting and dying in the front line against the Nazi and Italian forces who enabled Franco's victory. Note also how he never says a positive word about the Soviet Union, which was the only country to help the Republic, while the British and French governments helped Hitler and Mussolini to intervene.

Homage to freedom and equality, 19 Mar 2008
The Spanish civil war is possibly, alongside the Paris Commune of 1871, the period of history I wished to have taken an active part in. George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia is the best portrayal I've read so far on this period and an inspired and inspiring piece of literature. A very personal account of the war that doesn't neglect the social and political background, its implications and the influence it had on 20th century history. Ever wondered why the Spanish Civil war meant so much to so many around the world? Think you know what it really stood for? Ever questioned why the leftists (socialists, communists and anarchists) lost? Then this is the book for you.

Famous first-hand account of Spain's 1936-7 Civil War, 24 Feb 2008
A recent trip to Barcelona made me pull this book off my bookshelf, where it had been gathering dust since I first read it as a teenager 12 years ago. At the time I was very much into Orwell - his socialism, his hatred of Capitalism and his championing of the working classes. Though writing half a century earlier, he seemed to voice much of what myself and the other youths I hung around with believed.

Out of all Orwell's books that I read, I found this the least enjoyable and the most hard-going. I couldn't make head nor tail of who the different sides were, who was fighting who, what each side was fighting for and the complicated party politics of a Spain that existed nearly 60 years in the past.

The book is akin to Down and Out in Paris and London in that Orwell throws himself into an impoverished and dangerous situation which is not necessary for one of his social class and talents. Yet he does it anyway, mainly, I think, to provide the raw experience from which he can create these masterful literary accounts. In Paris and London Orwell writes about poverty and homelessness. Here he is writing about a war which, at first at least, he sees as being between 'the Fascists' and 'the working classes' (a perfect Orwellian subject). In the earlier book Orwell becomes a tramp. Here he becomes a soldier - a militiaman in a foreign army. Strange and noble that he should suffer so much for his art. However, 12 years on from my first reading, I can't help viewing Orwell's behaviour as a slightly patronising kind of 'social tourism'. When he has had enough, Orwell is able to, and in fact does, escape back to a comfortable middle-class existence back in England. This escape clause is not open to the real tramps, 'peasants' and militiamen he mixes with. This is not a severe criticism, though. Undoubtedly Orwell did genuinely care about the social injustices he witnessed and he was clearly trying to draw attention to them and strive for reform (he was instrumental in setting up the NHS in the 1940s).

This time I understood little more of what was going on than first time round. However, despite my lack of understanding, and despite having a markedly different political stance than I did as a teenager, I found the book to be much more rewarding this time round. Orwell's matter-of-fact reportage of trench warfare and street fighting is fascinating. His vivid descriptions of the antiquated weapons, attacking an enemy position, the freezing nights and the human lice - not to mention of getting shot through the throat ("The whole experience of being hit by a bullet is very interesting and I think it is worth describing in detail") - are vivid and eloquent. Also, you can see here embryonic elements that made it into Nineteen Eighty-Four (the systematic suppression and even murder of those that disagree with the state view, for instance).

This time round I was gripped all the way to the last sentence, by which time Orwell has returned home and finds England "sleeping the deep deep sleep of England, from which I sometimes fear we shall never wake till we are jerked out of it by the roar of bombs." Chilling when you reflect that this book was published in 1938, only a year before WW2 broke out.

A brilliant book, author and anarchist, 20 Oct 2007
Orwell has been slandered slightly with the title of socialist. This book well and truly shows his colours - multicoloured of course. The book is an outstanding account and description of the Spanish Civil War, an excellent portrayal of effective anarchism in action in Barcelona in those early days, a brilliant advertisement for pacifism, and an excellent insight into the mind of someone whose lasting influnce in the world has even changed the language. Thought police, Big Brother, Room 101 - all terms inspired by true events outlined in this classic book. There's memorable glimpses into the horrors of life in war - the food shortages, rats, the seemingly-trivial issues of looking for firewood, the lack of actual fighting, but the fun and camaradery too.

There's so much in this little book - masculinity, class, war, socialism, anarchism and descriptions of the Ramblas in Barcelona that have stood the test of time.

Simply Brilliant , 06 Dec 2006
This book is truly essential reading for anyone interested in the Spanish Civil War, or for that matter anyone with an interest in war, Communism, Socialism, Anarchism or in Literature. Orwell's account of the Spanish Civil War is more than just a brilliant account of life in a civil war, it is a first hand account of the horrors of Stalinism, and Orwell's experiences in Spain explain why he later wrote his best known works, 1984 and Animal Farm, to warn of the dangers which he knew so well.

The book starts out recounting Orwell's experiences of arriving in Spain as an eager volunteer wanting to help fight Fascism. He is shocked to discover the disorganisation and inefficiency of the Republican militias. The book then goes on to give a telling account of the boredom of trench warfare, where the naïve Orwell wants to be able to kill at least one Fascist to do his part in the struggle for freedom, but ends up mainly having to contend with lice, rats and the freezing weather.

This alone might make for an interesting read, but the book really comes into its own in the latter chapters, where Orwell describes the struggle going on within the Republican controlled region of Spain. A wounded Orwell returns to Barcelona, where the Stalinists who have seized control of the government turn on their political rivals. Orwell is well placed to describe the May fighting between the Stalinist police who wish to enforce state control and the idealistic anarchists who want to defend their revolutionary gains.

Following the government victory, Orwell's small political party the POUM is made a scapegoat for the fighting and is outlawed. A stunned Orwell is forced to go on the run from the very Republic for which he had been so willing to risk his life. This makes for a damning indictment of totalitarianism that is still capable of gripping and infuriating the reader generations after the events described. Orwell shows that he is one of the finest writers in the English language, and this is probably his finest work, deserving to be read by all.


Quite honestly a terrible book, 01 Oct 2008
This must be a contender for the worst book I've ever read. I read 'The Alchemist' by the same author largely because it appeared in the 'BBC 100 favourite reads' poll and was described as 'life changing'. I didn't like it, but thought this may just be due to the fact that the story is a cross between a parable and a self-help book, and decided to give Coelho another go. I shouldn't have bothered!
The story here is of a naive young Brazilian girl wanting to make some money by travelling to Switzerland ostensibly as a dancer, but soon becomes involved in prostitution. It's full of unbelievable scenarios and characters, some of which are frankly risible, mixed with a generous dose of half-baked adolescent philosophy. The heroine moves from an abortive S&M encounter to embracing it with full gusto in the blink of an eye after a brief walk along Lake Geneva, before finding her true love. The ridiculously cheesey ending had me reaching for a brown paper bag.
The writing style is very simple (translated from Portugese), and makes it easy to read, although lacking in depth. Thankfully it's short.
I'm amazed anyone could give this 5 stars!
Oh, .....did I mention I didn't like it??

Vying for top spot for my number 1 book!, 30 Sep 2008
This is the first of Coelho's books I've read - and it has quite simply left a profound impression on me. Very thought provoking and grabbed me from the first words, then dragged me through the rest as I couldn't keep up with the words. I guess some books speak only to you at the right point you pick it up - and this was one of those moments for me. Bought almost a year ago it's just been sitting on my shelf. And when I picked it up to start reading, I had no idea what the book was about or what Eleven Minutes meant.
One of the negative comments in an earlier review said you'll only enjoy this book if the Celestine Prophecy was your thing. Now much as I know the Celestine Prophecy has it's own cult following (of higher being spiritual schmaltz and all that), that book meant nothing to me and absolutely cannot be compared to Eleven Minutes at all.
I know that I will return to read this book several times and has now become a treasured possession.

Worth reading , 11 Mar 2008

This is my second reading for Paulo Coelho, Such amazing wonderful reading that I was enjoying each minute of it. I liked this as much as I liked The Alchemist.

The concept of the story ( despite the job of the main character as a hooker ) it gives alot of moral and themes for personal life.


This man has a lovely style of writing that capture you with him till the end, especially with this novel from a woman side

Overall, it is a worth reading for those who would like to understand the male and female for different sides.


Another 'follow your dreams' novel, 02 Mar 2008
Having sworn never again to read any more Paulo Coelho, my book group chose Eleven Minutes as this months read. This is now my 4th book by the author and I am no more a fan than after the first. I find his patronising style simplistic and child-like and he repeats 'key' statements ad nauseum throughout his books. While they are often quick reads - this one took less than 24hrs - I still end up wondering why I bothered.

Maria, a naive young Brazilian girl, decides to take a week's vacation in Rio de Janiero. There she meets a talent scout on the look out for dancers to perform in Geneva. Maria decides to take a chance but finds that things are not quite as she'd been led to believe. When she gets sacked for missing a day's work, things start to go down hill rapidly. She is almost broke when a man offers her a huge sum to sleep with him and from this it's not such a large step to becoming a high class prostitute, serving several men each night. Money is plentiful and Maria enjoys her status - will she continue with this life or return home with money and buy a farm??
In true Paulo Coelho style there is plenty of moralising about the subject, following on from the theme of following your dream in 'The Alchemist'
The character of Maria is apparently based on the life story of a prostitute that PC met while in Switzerland, but I still found her sudden expertise on sexual problems rather unbelievable.
I also thought the novel was rather sexually explicit for a book that I might find myself reading on the bus or other public place. Personally I feel that there is a fine line decreeing what is acceptable in a book for general consumption and this crossed it.

Wonderful!, 29 Dec 2007
Having loved Veronika decides to Die I had bought Eleven minutes and The Alchemist but unfortunately had never got around to reading them, until yesterday when recovering from a nasty flu&feeling slightly bored I decided to read Eleven minutes. That was it the minutes flew and before I knew it it was six thirty the next morning and I'd finished it. I could not put it down, another amazing book from an amazing writer. I love the fact that Coehlo can address the most nitty gritty of subjects with a tangible realism. Although his subject was sex it never felt like he was going too far he seemed to strike a perfect chord, even when re-telling the most degrading of Maria's sexual journeys. The honesty in which this book is written is beautiful you can truly relate to his character and understand that all she is searching for is love, yet a full love that revolves around an everday life. A closeness with someone that holds much more than just sex!. She takes us on a journey of honesty and we love her for that. She learns the true meaning of love in all its forms and makes us all think alittle about the difference between sex and making love. It is a gripping story with so many hidden meanings and as ever Paulo makes us question our own existence and indeed our own sexuality. Another inspirational piece of reading from the great Paulo Coelho. The Alchamest here I come!

Survival can turn us all into barbarians, 18 Nov 2008
What a book! When an epidemic of sudden blindness happens, the blind and those contaminated by them are quarantined in an old asylum where they are left to fend for themselves. This situation rapidly changes from quarantine into imprisonment and squalor as the blind fumble about - they befoul the corridors as they can't find the toilets, people get injured and die from infection. The army don't deliver enough food and everyone gets gaunt and hungry. When an armed gang of blind men take over the food distribution demanding first valuables and then women in payment, you are truly horrified where before you were revolted by the conditions. I can honestly say it makes you feel dirty.

But there is one person in the asylum who can see - the eye doctor's wife - rather than leave her husband she pretends to be blind, and secretly and subtly tries to help the others around her without giving her secret away. It is through her eyes that we see everything that is going on - and it is a huge burden for her which she bears with grace and dignity.

Eventually the armed gang is overcome, and the internees realise the army outside is gone too and they escape to find a world which has rapidly become a barbarian place as the entire population is now blind. Bodies litter the streets, everyone is searching for food, there is no clean water, dogs and rats scavenge everywhere.

Later there are some marvellous scenes which relieve you temporarily from this grim vision - the cleansing powers of a shower of rain and the friendly dog who licks the tears away. An astonishing and powerful book and powerful commentary on the denial and removal of basic human rights. It was easy to read, although Saramago's largely punctuationless style takes a while to get used to. It is one that will stay with me for a long time.

thought provoking and original , 30 Oct 2008
I was blown away by this book. The whole thing seems like a religious allegory for the selfish modern age. Equally the plot devise of mass population blindness can also be read as the imposing of martial law on a capitalist free state. What really kept me reading though was the writing. The story deals with blindness in a frank way that doesn't shy away from exposing the worst aspects of human nature when it comes to survival in a lawless environment. The character of the doctors wife in intriguing and the symbolism inherent in her characters actions becomes increasingly apparent towards the end of the book. Read it now before the less successful film comes out,

I just don't see it., 04 Oct 2008
This a good book, I just don't think it's as good as other people do. The title and the subject matter suggest a profound work and this really isn't.

The story is fairly engrossing, the characters well executed, but any intelligent insight is vague and suggestive but never conclusive. This 'blindness' doesn't work as the metaphor I suspect it is being intended as, and as such this is simply a 300 page novel about people being unable to see. Which is fairly interesting I suppose, but it say's little new about humanity facing certain challanges and drags on in the middle.

I've not read any of his other works, and I will at somepoint, but this doesn't justify the hype - I just don't see it.

Frightening, but compelling..., 22 Aug 2008
Now on the cusp of a forthcoming film adaptation, which should hopefully bring it some much deserved extra attention, Jose Saramago's extremely provoking book "Blindness" is a wonderfully evocative, frequently disturbing read.

The premise is straight forward; an unexplained disease of sudden blindness plagues a (purposefully) unnamed city. The consequences are predictably devastating.

The key to your final interpretation of this book rests with how you adapt to Saramago's unusual style. This is a book built almost of a series of long paragraphs, practically uninterrupted by normal punctuation. Characters have whole conversations without quotation marks - and it's occasionally quite easy to get lost as to who is speaking to who. The overall effect is dizzying, complex, but quite brilliant. It's an immediate jolt that tells you this is something quite unique. Perhaps it's not the best comparison, but it's akin to when I read my first Cormac McCarthy novel. Something about how it's written just doesn't feel quite right at first.

Stick with it though and you're richly rewarded by a brutal story and frightening imagery that fully deserve your attention. This is a very impressive book.

5 stars is not enough, 27 Jul 2008
This book is amazing, incredible, breathtaking. It was recommended to me and once I started it 2 days ago I have barely been able to put it down. This book has just earned a place in my top 5 ever books and deservedly so.

The story starts with a man in his car at traffic lights who goes suddenly blind. He is helped home by a stranger, who a few hours later also goes blind. Within a few days the blindness has spread round half the city and also those afflicted are herded up by the government into a disused mental assylum and left alone. The wards quickly become overrun with filth and chaos ensues. In the middle of this, though, we get to know a handful of characters very well and it is really their story that we follow through the neverending days, lack of food and riots. The whole story is told through long paragraphs of uunbroken text. There are no quotation marks, hardly any punctuation and none of the characters are given names.

I admit to being concerned that I would find it difficult to overcome the lack of punctuation, but for commas and fullstops, and the lack of names (characters are referred to in such ways as the girl with dark glasses, the boy with the squint etc) but not only was it very easy to get used to this it actually added to the story. Also, although the characters don't have names, I found myself identifying with and caring about these characters far more than I have done in other books as Saramago writing drags you in and you find yourself unable to let go. It's as though I was "there". Genius!

If you read nothing else this year, make it this. It is astounding and I only wish I could award more than 5 stars.


Homage to fascism, more like, 26 Mar 2008
Note how the great Orwell never says anything positive about those doing the bulk of the fighting against Franco - in fact, note how he barely mentions Franco and fascism at all! In the course of the events he descibes in this book, he spends most of his time doing nothing, like the rest of his Trotskyist and anarchist friends. Meanwhile, the Republicans, whom he slanders from afar, were fighting and dying in the front line against the Nazi and Italian forces who enabled Franco's victory. Note also how he never says a positive word about the Soviet Union, which was the only country to help the Republic, while the British and French governments helped Hitler and Mussolini to intervene.

Homage to freedom and equality, 19 Mar 2008
The Spanish civil war is possibly, alongside the Paris Commune of 1871, the period of history I wished to have taken an active part in. George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia is the best portrayal I've read so far on this period and an inspired and inspiring piece of literature. A very personal account of the war that doesn't neglect the social and political background, its implications and the influence it had on 20th century history. Ever wondered why the Spanish Civil war meant so much to so many around the world? Think you know what it really stood for? Ever questioned why the leftists (socialists, communists and anarchists) lost? Then this is the book for you.

Famous first-hand account of Spain's 1936-7 Civil War, 24 Feb 2008
A recent trip to Barcelona made me pull this book off my bookshelf, where it had been gathering dust since I first read it as a teenager 12 years ago. At the time I was very much into Orwell - his socialism, his hatred of Capitalism and his championing of the working classes. Though writing half a century earlier, he seemed to voice much of what myself and the other youths I hung around with believed.

Out of all Orwell's books that I read, I found this the least enjoyable and the most hard-going. I couldn't make head nor tail of who the different sides were, who was fighting who, what each side was fighting for and the complicated party politics of a Spain that existed nearly 60 years in the past.

The book is akin to Down and Out in Paris and London in that Orwell throws himself into an impoverished and dangerous situation which is not necessary for one of his social class and talents. Yet he does it anyway, mainly, I think, to provide the raw experience from which he can create these masterful literary accounts. In Paris and London Orwell writes about poverty and homelessness. Here he is writing about a war which, at first at least, he sees as being between 'the Fascists' and 'the working classes' (a perfect Orwellian subject). In the earlier book Orwell becomes a tramp. Here he becomes a soldier - a militiaman in a foreign army. Strange and noble that he should suffer so much for his art. However, 12 years on from my first reading, I can't help viewing Orwell's behaviour as a slightly patronising kind of 'social tourism'. When he has had enough, Orwell is able to, and in fact does, escape back to a comfortable middle-class existence back in England. This escape clause is not open to the real tramps, 'peasants' and militiamen he mixes with. This is not a severe criticism, though. Undoubtedly Orwell did genuinely care about the social injustices he witnessed and he was clearly trying to draw attention to them and strive for reform (he was instrumental in setting up the NHS in the 1940s).

This time I understood little more of what was going on than first time round. However, despite my lack of understanding, and despite having a markedly different political stance than I did as a teenager, I found the book to be much more rewarding this time round. Orwell's matter-of-fact reportage of trench warfare and street fighting is fascinating. His vivid descriptions of the antiquated weapons, attacking an enemy position, the freezing nights and the human lice - not to mention of getting shot through the throat ("The whole experience of being hit by a bullet is very interesting and I think it is worth describing in detail") - are vivid and eloquent. Also, you can see here embryonic elements that made it into Nineteen Eighty-Four (the systematic suppression and even murder of those that disagree with the state view, for instance).

This time round I was gripped all the way to the last sentence, by which time Orwell has returned home and finds England "sleeping the deep deep sleep of England, from which I sometimes fear we shall never wake till we are jerked out of it by the roar of bombs." Chilling when you reflect that this book was published in 1938, only a year before WW2 broke out.

A brilliant book, author and anarchist, 20 Oct 2007
Orwell has been slandered slightly with the title of socialist. This book well and truly shows his colours - multicoloured of course. The book is an outstanding account and description of the Spanish Civil War, an excellent portrayal of effective anarchism in action in Barcelona in those early days, a brilliant advertisement for pacifism, and an excellent insight into the mind of someone whose lasting influnce in the world has even changed the language. Thought police, Big Brother, Room 101 - all terms inspired by true events outlined in this classic book. There's memorable glimpses into the horrors of life in war - the food shortages, rats, the seemingly-trivial issues of looking for firewood, the lack of actual fighting, but the fun and camaradery too.

There's so much in this little book - masculinity, class, war, socialism, anarchism and descriptions of the Ramblas in Barcelona that have stood the test of time.

Simply Brilliant , 06 Dec 2006
This book is truly essential reading for anyone interested in the Spanish Civil War, or for that matter anyone with an interest in war, Communism, Socialism, Anarchism or in Literature. Orwell's account of the Spanish Civil War is more than just a brilliant account of life in a civil war, it is a first hand account of the horrors of Stalinism, and Orwell's experiences in Spain explain why he later wrote his best known works, 1984 and Animal Farm, to warn of the dangers which he knew so well.

The book starts out recounting Orwell's experiences of arriving in Spain as an eager volunteer wanting to help fight Fascism. He is shocked to discover the disorganisation and inefficiency of the Republican militias. The book then goes on to give a telling account of the boredom of trench warfare, where the naïve Orwell wants to be able to kill at least one Fascist to do his part in the struggle for freedom, but ends up mainly having to contend with lice, rats and the freezing weather.

This alone might make for an interesting read, but the book really comes into its own in the latter chapters, where Orwell describes the struggle going on within the Republican controlled region of Spain. A wounded Orwell returns to Barcelona, where the Stalinists who have seized control of the government turn on their political rivals. Orwell is well placed to describe the May fighting between the Stalinist police who wish to enforce state control and the idealistic anarchists who want to defend their revolutionary gains.

Following the government victory, Orwell's small political party the POUM is made a scapegoat for the fighting and is outlawed. A stunned Orwell is forced to go on the run from the very Republic for which he had been so willing to risk his life. This makes for a damning indictment of totalitarianism that is still capable of gripping and infuriating the reader generations after the events described. Orwell shows that he is one of the finest writers in the English language, and this is probably his finest work, deserving to be read by all.


Quite honestly a terrible book, 01 Oct 2008
This must be a contender for the worst book I've ever read. I read 'The Alchemist' by the same author largely because it appeared in the 'BBC 100 favourite reads' poll and was described as 'life changing'. I didn't like it, but thought this may just be due to the fact that the story is a cross between a parable and a self-help book, and decided to give Coelho another go. I shouldn't have bothered!
The story here is of a naive young Brazilian girl wanting to make some money by travelling to Switzerland ostensibly as a dancer, but soon becomes involved in prostitution. It's full of unbelievable scenarios and characters, some of which are frankly risible, mixed with a generous dose of half-baked adolescent philosophy. The heroine moves from an abortive S&M encounter to embracing it with full gusto in the blink of an eye after a brief walk along Lake Geneva, before finding her true love. The ridiculously cheesey ending had me reaching for a brown paper bag.
The writing style is very simple (translated from Portugese), and makes it easy to read, although lacking in depth. Thankfully it's short.
I'm amazed anyone could give this 5 stars!
Oh, .....did I mention I didn't like it??

Vying for top spot for my number 1 book!, 30 Sep 2008
This is the first of Coelho's books I've read - and it has quite simply left a profound impression on me. Very thought provoking and grabbed me from the first words, then dragged me through the rest as I couldn't keep up with the words. I guess some books speak only to you at the right point you pick it up - and this was one of those moments for me. Bought almost a year ago it's just been sitting on my shelf. And when I picked it up to start reading, I had no idea what the book was about or what Eleven Minutes meant.
One of the negative comments in an earlier review said you'll only enjoy this book if the Celestine Prophecy was your thing. Now much as I know the Celestine Prophecy has it's own cult following (of higher being spiritual schmaltz and all that), that book meant nothing to me and absolutely cannot be compared to Eleven Minutes at all.
I know that I will return to read this book several times and has now become a treasured possession.

Worth reading , 11 Mar 2008

This is my second reading for Paulo Coelho, Such amazing wonderful reading that I was enjoying each minute of it. I liked this as much as I liked The Alchemist.

The concept of the story ( despite the job of the main character as a hooker ) it gives alot of moral and themes for personal life.


This man has a lovely style of writing that capture you with him till the end, especially with this novel from a woman side

Overall, it is a worth reading for those who would like to understand the male and female for different sides.


Another 'follow your dreams' novel, 02 Mar 2008
Having sworn never again to read any more Paulo Coelho, my book group chose Eleven Minutes as this months read. This is now my 4th book by the author and I am no more a fan than after the first. I find his patronising style simplistic and child-like and he repeats 'key' statements ad nauseum throughout his books. While they are often quick reads - this one took less than 24hrs - I still end up wondering why I bothered.

Maria, a naive young Brazilian girl, decides to take a week's vacation in Rio de Janiero. There she meets a talent scout on the look out for dancers to perform in Geneva. Maria decides to take a chance but finds that things are not quite as she'd been led to believe. When she gets sacked for missing a day's work, things start to go down hill rapidly. She is almost broke when a man offers her a huge sum to sleep with him and from this it's not such a large step to becoming a high class prostitute, serving several men each night. Money is plentiful and Maria enjoys her status - will she continue with this life or return home with money and buy a farm??
In true Paulo Coelho style there is plenty of moralising about the subject, following on from the theme of following your dream in 'The Alchemist'
The character of Maria is apparently based on the life story of a prostitute that PC met while in Switzerland, but I still found her sudden expertise on sexual problems rather unbelievable.
I also thought the novel was rather sexually explicit for a book that I might find myself reading on the bus or other public place. Personally I feel that there is a fine line decreeing what is acceptable in a book for general consumption and this crossed it.

Wonderful!, 29 Dec 2007
Having loved Veronika decides to Die I had bought Eleven minutes and The Alchemist but unfortunately had never got around to reading them, until yesterday when recovering from a nasty flu&feeling slightly bored I decided to read Eleven minutes. That was it the minutes flew and before I knew it it was six thirty the next morning and I'd finished it. I could not put it down, another amazing book from an amazing writer. I love the fact that Coehlo can address the most nitty gritty of subjects with a tangible realism. Although his subject was sex it never felt like he was going too far he seemed to strike a perfect chord, even when re-telling the most degrading of Maria's sexual journeys. The honesty in which this book is written is beautiful you can truly relate to his character and understand that all she is searching for is love, yet a full love that revolves around an everday life. A closeness with someone that holds much more than just sex!. She takes us on a journey of honesty and we love her for that. She learns the true meaning of love in all its forms and makes us all think alittle about the difference between sex and making love. It is a gripping story with so many hidden meanings and as ever Paulo makes us question our own existence and indeed our own sexuality. Another inspirational piece of reading from the great Paulo Coelho. The Alchamest here I come!

the literary hand, 26 Oct 2008
To give you an example of Pessoa's thinking: on one solitary page of The Book of Disquiet the author remarks that there is nothing more difficult, it is said, to describe a spiral in words; that people find it necessary to use the unliterary hand to depict the object. Pessoa then describes a spiral as a snake without a snake, wound vertically around a branch that isn't there. I am paraphrasing, as it is possible that I have misquoted him slightly, but Pessoa's ability to describe his thoughts should still be evident. This is not a novel, it is instead pages upon pages of lucid fragments of thought and art. It is a pleasure to re and reread it.


Quiet, honest & sincere., 08 Jun 2008
This is a work that compels people to review it.. every graceful line, with every pause between lines, all seems as natural as breathing.

Every time this book is picked up & interacted with, something strange happens to people who read & are read by it...some-one who is adrift in their head wakes up hazily, and reminds the reading person that they are capable of so utterably similar thoughts, so incredibly empathic perceptions, that the persuasion of Pessoa is as easily absorbed as oxygen into blood.

Then one realises one has just said all this out loud, and a menagerie of people will be irritated and yet another prospective escapee will be intrigued. If you have to read something about humanity before you live, nothing comes closer than this to an honest attempt at a self.



Nothing else I've ever read comes close, 18 Apr 2008
This is not a great work of fiction, so look elsewhere if that's what you want. What this book is is quite simply the most honest description of the human condition I've ever read - ever page has something so profoundly true on it that it literally takes one's breath away.

Incredible.

A necessary poison, 13 Jul 2007
For me, to write is self-deprecating, and yet I can't quit doing it. Writing is like a drug I abhor and keep taking, the addiction I despise and depend on. There are necessary poisons, and some are extremely subtle, composed of ingredients from the soul, herbs collected from among the ruins of dreams, black poppies found next to the graves of our intentions, the long leaves of obscene trees whose branches sway on the echoing banks of the soul's infernal rivers. To write is to lose myself, yes, but everyone loses himself, because everything gets lost. I, however, lose myself without any joy - not like the river flowing into the sea for which it was secretly born, but like the puddle left on the beach by the hide tide, its stranded water never returning to the ocean but merely sinking in the sand..

Random selection page 137 / found in a box in the rain in feb 2007 haven't been able to put it down since. Every page is absorbing. Long live Pessoa.

palimpsest of the soul, 05 Jul 2005
When I found this book, totally by chance, this was the book I'd been waiting for. This is the book I'd take if the house was burning down. This would be the book I'd want on a desert island. This is clear eyed, unbearably honest, pragmatic existensialism. It's Dylan's "there's no success like failure, and failure's no success at all" writ large. I've known it for some years now, and I cannot imagine life without it. The most human of documents for contemporary contemplation.

Survival can turn us all into barbarians, 18 Nov 2008
What a book! When an epidemic of sudden blindness happens, the blind and those contaminated by them are quarantined in an old asylum where they are left to fend for themselves. This situation rapidly changes from quarantine into imprisonment and squalor as the blind fumble about - they befoul the corridors as they can't find the toilets, people get injured and die from infection. The army don't deliver enough food and everyone gets gaunt and hungry. When an armed gang of blind men take over the food distribution demanding first valuables and then women in payment, you are truly horrified where before you were revolted by the conditions. I can honestly say it makes you feel dirty.

But there is one person in the asylum who can see - the eye doctor's wife - rather than leave her husband she pretends to be blind, and secretly and subtly tries to help the others around her without giving her secret away. It is through her eyes that we see everything that is going on - and it is a huge burden for her which she bears with grace and dignity.

Eventually the armed gang is overcome, and the internees realise the army outside is gone too and they escape to find a world which has rapidly become a barbarian place as the entire population is now blind. Bodies litter the streets, everyone is searching for food, there is no clean water, dogs and rats scavenge everywhere.

Later there are some marvellous scenes which relieve you temporarily from this grim vision - the cleansing powers of a shower of rain and the friendly dog who licks the tears away. An astonishing and powerful book and powerful commentary on the denial and removal of basic human rights. It was easy to read, although Saramago's largely punctuationless style takes a while to get used to. It is one that will stay with me for a long time.

thought provoking and original , 30 Oct 2008
I was blown away by this book. The whole thing seems like a religious allegory for the selfish modern age. Equally the plot devise of mass population blindness can also be read as the imposing of martial law on a capitalist free state. What really kept me reading though was the writing. The story deals with blindness in a frank way that doesn't shy away from exposing the worst aspects of human nature when it comes to survival in a lawless environment. The character of the doctors wife in intriguing and the symbolism inherent in her characters actions becomes increasingly apparent towards the end of the book. Read it now before the less successful film comes out,

I just don't see it., 04 Oct 2008
This a good book, I just don't think it's as good as other people do. The title and the subject matter suggest a profound work and this really isn't.

The story is fairly engrossing, the characters well executed, but any intelligent insight is vague and suggestive but never conclusive. This 'blindness' doesn't work as the metaphor I suspect it is being intended as, and as such this is simply a 300 page novel about people being unable to see. Which is fairly interesting I suppose, but it say's little new about humanity facing certain challanges and drags on in the middle.

I've not read any of his other works, and I will at somepoint, but this doesn't justify the hype - I just don't see it.

Frightening, but compelling..., 22 Aug 2008
Now on the cusp of a forthcoming film adaptation, which should hopefully bring it some much deserved extra attention, Jose Saramago's extremely provoking book "Blindness" is a wonderfully evocative, frequently disturbing read.

The premise is straight forward; an unexplained disease of sudden blindness plagues a (purposefully) unnamed city. The consequences are predictably devastating.

The key to your final interpretation of this book rests with how you adapt to Saramago's unusual style. This is a book built almost of a series of long paragraphs, practically uninterrupted by normal punctuation. Characters have whole conversations without quotation marks - and it's occasionally quite easy to get lost as to who is speaking to who. The overall effect is dizzying, complex, but quite brilliant. It's an immediate jolt that tells you this is something quite unique. Perhaps it's not the best comparison, but it's akin to when I read my first Cormac McCarthy novel. Something about how it's written just doesn't feel quite right at first.

Stick with it though and you're richly rewarded by a brutal story and frightening imagery that fully deserve your attention. This is a very impressive book.

5 stars is not enough, 27 Jul 2008
This book is amazing, incredible, breathtaking. It was recommended to me and once I started it 2 days ago I have barely been able to put it down. This book has just earned a place in my top 5 ever books and deservedly so.

The story starts with a man in his car at traffic lights who goes suddenly blind. He is helped home by a stranger, who a few hours later also goes blind. Within a few days the blindness has spread round half the city and also those afflicted are herded up by the government into a disused mental assylum and left alone. The wards quickly become overrun with filth and chaos ensues. In the middle of this, though, we get to know a handful of characters very well and it is really their story that we follow through the neverending days, lack of food and riots. The whole story is told through long paragraphs of uunbroken text. There are no quotation marks, hardly any punctuation and none of the characters are given names.

I admit to being concerned that I would find it difficult to overcome the lack of punctuation, but for commas and fullstops, and the lack of names (characters are referred to in such ways as the girl with dark glasses, the boy with the squint etc) but not only was it very easy to get used to this it actually added to the story. Also, although the characters don't have names, I found myself identifying with and caring about these characters far more than I have done in other books as Saramago writing drags you in and you find yourself unable to let go. It's as though I was "there". Genius!

If you read nothing else this year, make it this. It is astounding and I only wish I could award more than 5 stars.


Homage to fascism, more like, 26 Mar 2008
Note how the great Orwell never says anything positive about those doing the bulk of the fighting against Franco - in fact, note how he barely mentions Franco and fascism at all! In the course of the events he descibes in this book, he spends most of his time doing nothing, like the rest of his Trotskyist and anarchist friends. Meanwhile, the Republicans, whom he slanders from afar, were fighting and dying in the front line against the Nazi and Italian forces who enabled Franco's victory. Note also how he never says a positive word about the Soviet Union, which was the only country to help the Republic, while the British and French governments helped Hitler and Mussolini to intervene.

Homage to freedom and equality, 19 Mar 2008
The Spanish civil war is possibly, alongside the Paris Commune of 1871, the period of history I wished to have taken an active part in. George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia is the best portrayal I've read so far on this period and an inspired and inspiring piece of literature. A very personal account of the war that doesn't neglect the social and political background, its implications and the influence it had on 20th century history. Ever wondered why the Spanish Civil war meant so much to so many around the world? Think you know what it really stood for? Ever questioned why the leftists (socialists, communists and anarchists) lost? Then this is the book for you.

Famous first-hand account of Spain's 1936-7 Civil War, 24 Feb 2008
A recent trip to Barcelona made me pull this book off my bookshelf, where it had been gathering dust since I first read it as a teenager 12 years ago. At the time I was very much into Orwell - his socialism, his hatred of Capitalism and his championing of the working classes. Though writing half a century earlier, he seemed to voice much of what myself and the other youths I hung around with believed.

Out of all Orwell's books that I read, I found this the least enjoyable and the most hard-going. I couldn't make head nor tail of who the different sides were, who was fighting who, what each side was fighting for and the complicated party politics of a Spain that existed nearly 60 years in the past.

The book is akin to Down and Out in Paris and London in that Orwell throws himself into an impoverished and dangerous situation which is not necessary for one of his social class and talents. Yet he does it anyway, mainly, I think, to provide the raw experience from which he can create these masterful literary accounts. In Paris and London Orwell writes about poverty and homelessness. Here he is writing about a war which, at first at least, he sees as being between 'the Fascists' and 'the working classes' (a perfect Orwellian subject). In the earlier book Orwell becomes a tramp. Here he becomes a soldier - a militiaman in a foreign army. Strange and noble that he should suffer so much for his art. However, 12 years on from my first reading, I can't help viewing Orwell's behaviour as a slightly patronising kind of 'social tourism'. When he has had enough, Orwell is able to, and in fact does, escape back to a comfortable middle-class existence back in England. This escape clause is not open to the real tramps, 'peasants' and militiamen he mixes with. This is not a severe criticism, though. Undoubtedly Orwell did genuinely care about the social injustices he witnessed and he was clearly trying to draw attention to them and strive for reform (he was instrumental in setting up the NHS in the 1940s).

This time I understood little more of what was going on than first time round. However, despite my lack of understanding, and despite having a markedly different political stance than I did as a teenager, I found the book to be much more rewarding this time round. Orwell's matter-of-fact reportage of trench warfare and street fighting is fascinating. His vivid descriptions of the antiquated weapons, attacking an enemy position, the freezing nights and the human lice - not to mention of getting shot through the throat ("The whole experience of being hit by a bullet is very interesting and I think it is worth describing in detail") - are vivid and eloquent. Also, you can see here embryonic elements that made it into Nineteen Eighty-Four (the systematic suppression and even murder of those that disagree with the state view, for instance).

This time round I was gripped all the way to the last sentence, by which time Orwell has returned home and finds England "sleeping the deep deep sleep of England, from which I sometimes fear we shall never wake till we are jerked out of it by the roar of bombs." Chilling when you reflect that this book was published in 1938, only a year before WW2 broke out.

A brilliant book, author and anarchist, 20 Oct 2007
Orwell has been slandered slightly with the title of socialist. This book well and truly shows his colours - multicoloured of course. The book is an outstanding account and description of the Spanish Civil War, an excellent portrayal of effective anarchism in action in Barcelona in those early days, a brilliant advertisement for pacifism, and an excellent insight into the mind of someone whose lasting influnce in the world has even changed the language. Thought police, Big Brother, Room 101 - all terms inspired by true events outlined in this classic book. There's memorable glimpses into the horrors of life in war - the food shortages, rats, the seemingly-trivial issues of looking for firewood, the lack of actual fighting, but the fun and camaradery too.

There's so much in this little book - masculinity, class, war, socialism, anarchism and descriptions of the Ramblas in Barcelona that have stood the test of time.

Simply Brilliant , 06 Dec 2006
This book is truly essential reading for anyone interested in the Spanish Civil War, or for that matter anyone with an interest in war, Communism, Socialism, Anarchism or in Literature. Orwell's account of the Spanish Civil War is more than just a brilliant account of life in a civil war, it is a first hand account of the horrors of Stalinism, and Orwell's experiences in Spain explain why he later wrote his best known works, 1984 and Animal Farm, to warn of the dangers which he knew so well.

The book starts out recounting Orwell's experiences of arriving in Spain as an eager volunteer wanting to help fight Fascism. He is shocked to discover the disorganisation and inefficiency of the Republican militias. The book then goes on to give a telling account of the boredom of trench warfare, where the naïve Orwell wants to be able to kill at least one Fascist to do his part in the struggle for freedom, but ends up mainly having to contend with lice, rats and the freezing weather.

This alone might make for an interesting read, but the book really comes into its own in the latter chapters, where Orwell describes the struggle going on within the Republican controlled region of Spain. A wounded Orwell returns to Barcelona, where the Stalinists who have seized control of the government turn on their political rivals. Orwell is well placed to describe the May fighting between the Stalinist police who wish to enforce state control and the idealistic anarchists who want to defend their revolutionary gains.

Following the government victory, Orwell's small political party the POUM is made a scapegoat for the fighting and is outlawed. A stunned Orwell is forced to go on the run from the very Republic for which he had been so willing to risk his life. This makes for a damning indictment of totalitarianism that is still capable of gripping and infuriating the reader generations after the events described. Orwell shows that he is one of the finest writers in the English language, and this is probably his finest work, deserving to be read by all.


Quite honestly a terrible book, 01 Oct 2008
This must be a contender for the worst book I've ever read. I read 'The Alchemist' by the same author largely because it appeared in the 'BBC 100 favourite reads' poll and was described as 'life changing'. I didn't like it, but thought this may just be due to the fact that the story is a cross between a parable and a self-help book, and decided to give Coelho another go. I shouldn't have bothered!
The story here is of a naive young Brazilian girl wanting to make some money by travelling to Switzerland ostensibly as a dancer, but soon becomes involved in prostitution. It's full of unbelievable scenarios and characters, some of which are frankly risible, mixed with a generous dose of half-baked adolescent philosophy. The heroine moves from an abortive S&M encounter to embracing it with full gusto in the blink of an eye after a brief walk along Lake Geneva, before finding her true love. The ridiculously cheesey ending had me reaching for a brown paper bag.
The writing style is very simple (translated from Portugese), and makes it easy to read, although lacking in depth. Thankfully it's short.
I'm amazed anyone could give this 5 stars!
Oh, .....did I mention I didn't like it??

Vying for top spot for my number 1 book!, 30 Sep 2008
This is the first of Coelho's books I've read - and it has quite simply left a profound impression on me. Very thought provoking and grabbed me from the first words, then dragged me through the rest as I couldn't keep up with the words. I guess some books speak only to you at the right point you pick it up - and this was one of those moments for me. Bought almost a year ago it's just been sitting on my shelf. And when I picked it up to start reading, I had no idea what the book was about or what Eleven Minutes meant.
One of the negative comments in an earlier review said you'll only enjoy this book if the Celestine Prophecy was your thing. Now much as I know the Celestine Prophecy has it's own cult following (of higher being spiritual schmaltz and all that), that book meant nothing to me and absolutely cannot be compared to Eleven Minutes at all.
I know that I will return to read this book several times and has now become a treasured possession.

Worth reading , 11 Mar 2008

This is my second reading for Paulo Coelho, Such amazing wonderful reading that I was enjoying each minute of it. I liked this as much as I liked The Alchemist.

The concept of the story ( despite the job of the main character as a hooker ) it gives alot of moral and themes for personal life.


This man has a lovely style of writing that capture you with him till the end, especially with this novel from a woman side

Overall, it is a worth reading for those who would like to understand the male and female for different sides.


Another 'follow your dreams' novel, 02 Mar 2008
Having sworn never again to read any more Paulo Coelho, my book group chose Eleven Minutes as this months read. This is now my 4th book by the author and I am no more a fan than after the first. I find his patronising style simplistic and child-like and he repeats 'key' statements ad nauseum throughout his books. While they are often quick reads - this one took less than 24hrs - I still end up wondering why I bothered.

Maria, a naive young Brazilian girl, decides to take a week's vacation in Rio de Janiero. There she meets a talent scout on the look out for dancers to perform in Geneva. Maria decides to take a chance but finds that things are not quite as she'd been led to believe. When she gets sacked for missing a day's work, things start to go down hill rapidly. She is almost broke when a man offers her a huge sum to sleep with him and from this it's not such a large step to becoming a high class prostitute, serving several men each night. Money is plentiful and Maria enjoys her status - will she continue with this life or return home with money and buy a farm??
In true Paulo Coelho style there is plenty of moralising about the subject, following on from the theme of following your dream in 'The Alchemist'
The character of Maria is apparently based on the life story of a prostitute that PC met while in Switzerland, but I still found her sudden expertise on sexual problems rather unbelievable.
I also thought the novel was rather sexually explicit for a book that I might find myself reading on the bus or other public place. Personally I feel that there is a fine line decreeing what is acceptable in a book for general consumption and this crossed it.

Wonderful!, 29 Dec 2007
Having loved Veronika decides to Die I had bought Eleven minutes and The Alchemist but unfortunately had never got around to reading them, until yesterday when recovering from a nasty flu&feeling slightly bored I decided to read Eleven minutes. That was it the minutes flew and before I knew it it was six thirty the next morning and I'd finished it. I could not put it down, another amazing book from an amazing writer. I love the fact that Coehlo can address the most nitty gritty of subjects with a tangible realism. Although his subject was sex it never felt like he was going too far he seemed to strike a perfect chord, even when re-telling the most degrading of Maria's sexual journeys. The honesty in which this book is written is beautiful you can truly relate to his character and understand that all she is searching for is love, yet a full love that revolves around an everday life. A closeness with someone that holds much more than just sex!. She takes us on a journey of honesty and we love her for that. She learns the true meaning of love in all its forms and makes us all think alittle about the difference between sex and making love. It is a gripping story with so many hidden meanings and as ever Paulo makes us question our own existence and indeed our own sexuality. Another inspirational piece of reading from the great Paulo Coelho. The Alchamest here I come!

the literary hand, 26 Oct 2008
To give you an example of Pessoa's thinking: on one solitary page of The Book of Disquiet the author remarks that there is nothing more difficult, it is said, to describe a spiral in words; that people find it necessary to use the unliterary hand to depict the object. Pessoa then describes a spiral as a snake without a snake, wound vertically around a branch that isn't there. I am paraphrasing, as it is possible that I have misquoted him slightly, but Pessoa's ability to describe his thoughts should still be evident. This is not a novel, it is instead pages upon pages of lucid fragments of thought and art. It is a pleasure to re and reread it.


Quiet, honest & sincere., 08 Jun 2008
This is a work that compels people to review it.. every graceful line, with every pause between lines, all seems as natural as breathing.

Every time this book is picked up & interacted with, something strange happens to people who read & are read by it...some-one who is adrift in their head wakes up hazily, and reminds the reading person that they are capable of so utterably similar thoughts, so incredibly empathic perceptions, that the persuasion of Pessoa is as easily absorbed as oxygen into blood.

Then one realises one has just said all this out loud, and a menagerie of people will be irritated and yet another prospective escapee will be intrigued. If you have to read something about humanity before you live, nothing comes closer than this to an honest attempt at a self.



Nothing else I've ever read comes close, 18 Apr 2008
This is not a great work of fiction, so look elsewhere if that's what you want. What this book is is quite simply the most honest description of the human condition I've ever read - ever page has something so profoundly true on it that it literally takes one's breath away.

Incredible.

A necessary poison, 13 Jul 2007
For me, to write is self-deprecating, and yet I can't quit doing it. Writing is like a drug I abhor and keep taking, the addiction I despise and depend on. There are necessary poisons, and some are extremely subtle, composed of ingredients from the soul, herbs collected from among the ruins of dreams, black poppies found next to the graves of our intentions, the long leaves of obscene trees whose branches sway on the echoing banks of the soul's infernal rivers. To write is to lose myself, yes, but everyone loses himself, because everything gets lost. I, however, lose myself without any joy - not like the river flowing into the sea for which it was secretly born, but like the puddle left on the beach by the hide tide, its stranded water never returning to the ocean but merely sinking in the sand..

Random selection page 137 / found in a box in the rain in feb 2007 haven't been able to put it down since. Every page is absorbing. Long live Pessoa.

palimpsest of the soul, 05 Jul 2005
When I found this book, totally by chance, this was the book I'd been waiting for. This is the book I'd take if the house was burning down. This would be the book I'd want on a desert island. This is clear eyed, unbearably honest, pragmatic existensialism. It's Dylan's "there's no success like failure, and failure's no success at all" writ large. I've known it for some years now, and I cannot imagine life without it. The most human of documents for contemporary contemplation.

Machado de Assis, 08 Jun 1999
Firstly, the novel is not principally intended to be an exposition of nineteenth-century Brazilian society, despite what several critics have said. That would make it pretty boring. It has more to do with the failure of memory, the inescapability of origins and the nature of the novel itself. Machado lampoons (for want of a better word) the idea of the novel as a reflection of reality; after all, Bento is very nearly a madman - on this point I'm sure Graciliano Ramos is directly indebted to Machado. This mocking approach to Realism, incidentally, gives the novel a very modern feel. Bento suffers under the illusion that he can dig up the past in a scientific, observational manner (confer his son, Ezequiel, who becomes an archaeologist). A further level of irony is that while the novel is written in the first person, we can see more of the picture than the narrator because he lets things slip. So the novel is, with a twist that Machado would have appreciated, more real than anything he could have written in the 'objective' third person because the reader is included in the creative process. There are ambiguities as well as ironies, much as in life.

The novel is also interesting as a tragedy. I suspect that Bento tries very hard to give his own story the same weight as Othello's. As I believe, he fails to compare himself satisfactorily with great tragic figures from the past or in literature (look at the statues in his home). This is because Machado knows that he is writing something better, something which doesn't need to call on past precedent because it is new. The tragedy part is very modern, because he doesn't actually kill Capitu. In fact, the only thing that really ends up murdered is his own soul.

I would argue that the basic content of Dom Casmurro could have been set anywhere. The major points of the story and characterisation could have occurred in Europe or North America.If Machado is condemning society, then that society is still - even now - omnipresent. And he was very much a part of it in his own lifetime.

Finally, please bear in mind that the book is also very funny. Look at José Dias for reference on that point, not to mention the flights of fancy.

Oh, and about whether Capitu really was unfaithful - who cares?

espresso or macchiato?, 26 Nov 1998
One of the chapters is simply called "The Cup of Coffee"-- a dark, delicious page of a chapter that will probably lead you into the kitchen, wondering what sort of coffee Machado de Assis would have drunk. It would have been fast, you tell yourself as you fill your stovetop machine, standing up at one of those long counters in the back of a well-known cafe. One quick sip. A small white cup. That much is obvious. But as the black liquid begins to bubble up, you start to think about the dollop of foam that separates the sweet tang of espresso from the subtleties of a morning macchiato, and you ask yourself, as your reach for the milk, would Machado...?

A universal literature masterpiece, 19 Nov 1998
Machado de Assis is perhaps the greatest Portuguese language romancist, and certainly the most important Brazilian author. This book is his best work. In a very short manner, it could be desribed as a "Brazilian Ottello", but it mustn't be be considered as a version of the Shakespeare classic, but a unique story, very reach in itself. Machado has an amazing ability to make the reader feel like his characters, and involves us in a tram where the complete uncertainty and blind jealousy is thrilling, and rises our deepest passionate feelings, for or against the main character. This book is a definitely a must read for everyone who enjoys good literature.

A Masterpiece of World Literature, 29 Sep 1998
Machado de Assis is probably one of the most underrated authors literature departments around the US-and other countries-have (not) encountered. He is an absolute requirement for anyone who wishes to consider him/herself well-read. Called "Othello of the Southern Cross" by Helen Caldwell (who wrote the excellent The Brazilian Othello of Machado de Assis-A Study of Dom Casmurro, Berkeley:University of California Press, 1960) this narrative is, among other things, about a man's weakness and fear before the possibility of living life fully (see chapter called 'Are you Scared?). There is a fascinating element of vicariousness- the way Bento Santiago (Saint and Iago, as Caldwell cleverly points out) projects his guilt, sexuality, desires and ambition upon Capitu, and Escobar... For those who missed the point (reader from NY- give it another try) I recommend a different approach, a different translation, or perhaps a course in Portuguese...(why not? Discover a rich and abundant culture!) This is true art.

A lifelong favorite, 07 Jul 1998
When I first read this book, back in 1987, I was about to marry the girl who had lived next door ever since I was 10. I instantly knew the book would be a lifelong favorite because of the wonderful, simple, and short descriptions of childhood love in one of the early chapters. The question of unfaithfulness Machado created in my mind was only a scholarly one, it did not touch me as emotionally as the passages of childhood love, simply because it was unconceivable that such a thing would happen to us. I was convinced of Capitu's innocence and appreciated it enormously that Machado does not provide us with a clear-cut verdict. Now, 10 years later, I have reread the book because my Capitu is gone and all I have left are questions so similar to Dom Casmurro's that it is frightening. The book has a completely new meaning to me, and Capitu's guilt is screaming at me from virtually every page. I now even more appreciate it that Machado does not provide us with the truth, because such, apparently, is life. This is a book to read slowly, let it soak in gently into your soul during a couple of days if not weeks, and when done, have your love read it, and then talk about it for weeks. It also is a book to keep and read again years later. A new, different version of you will probably find rather different things in it. Both translations, in 1987 I read a Dutch translation, and recently an English one, manage to make clear that Machado had a way with words that is very intriguing. Sometimes so much is said with so few simple words. The real book is written between the lines.