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A review by honnari_hannya
Blindness by José Saramago
2.0
CW: Ableism, Sexual Assault, Pandemics
After a pandemic that causes inexplicable blindness sweeps the world, a group of infected people are interned inside a psychiatric ward and experience the breakdown of human society in small scale (that eventually becomes large scale).
This was okay—a classic that I've wanted to read for a while but ended up disappointing me. It has very familiar themes of humanity devolving to their baser instincts when tragedy strikes and disaster happens, with a smidge of "except maybe there is something redeemable in a few select people."
Perhaps it was just me, but I did not appreciate the constant dehumanization of blind people. Even beyond the abuse that they suffer in the novel as part of the story, there were so many instances where this book implied that blind people somehow live less full lives without sight. There was even a section where it said that blind people did not know how to truly love without being able to see. Perhaps acceptable in 1995 when it was written (I doubt it???) but definitely not now.
After a pandemic that causes inexplicable blindness sweeps the world, a group of infected people are interned inside a psychiatric ward and experience the breakdown of human society in small scale (that eventually becomes large scale).
This was okay—a classic that I've wanted to read for a while but ended up disappointing me. It has very familiar themes of humanity devolving to their baser instincts when tragedy strikes and disaster happens, with a smidge of "except maybe there is something redeemable in a few select people."
Perhaps it was just me, but I did not appreciate the constant dehumanization of blind people. Even beyond the abuse that they suffer in the novel as part of the story, there were so many instances where this book implied that blind people somehow live less full lives without sight. There was even a section where it said that blind people did not know how to truly love without being able to see. Perhaps acceptable in 1995 when it was written (I doubt it???) but definitely not now.