So, I have a complaint. It's not Saramago-specific, but he is the latest in a long line of authors that I've noticed using this trick/device/method. More and more I find authors using long lists as a way of describing something, as if an extensive vocabulary can hide someone's lack of a point. This niggling little issue has been eating at me recently because I've taken to reading books aloud and find myself running short of breath halfway through these interminable lists. It finally wiggled its way up into my consciousness yesterday as I was reading The Cave and Saramago embarked on a multi-page description of all the different types of people in an encyclopedia. Musketeers and eskimos and mandarins and aborigines and nurses and nuns and politicians and generals and construction workers and schoolteachers and bodhisatvas and arctic explorers and on and on and on. I GET IT!!! But is he done? Hell no! He needs to describe the minutiae of each person's wardrobe and coloring! Having this come right on the heels of a multi-page discourse on cliches and their authoritarian nature (which included a listing of nearly every possible cliche ever) was the straw that broke this camel's back (Yeah, I used one. What about it?).

The most egregious promulgator of this technique is easily Tom Robbins, who never uses two or three descriptors when a dozen will do. A brain is never just a mound of tissue when we have a minimum word count to reach and it can be described as having "...webs and cords and stems and ridges and fissures... glands and nodes and nerves and lobes and fluids, with its capacity to perceive and analyze and refine and edit and store, with its talent for orchestrating emotions ranging from eye-rolling ecstasy to loose-bowel fear, with its appetite for input its generosity of output..." Great, I get it. You have a copy of Gray's Anatomy sitting next to you and you really want your reader to understand the depths of the brain. But this is just one of the things described in this page-long chapter. I can understand the desire, but you would think that it would be a more effective device were it employed more sparingly. An abundance of information is not a replacement for character development.

/rant

Back to the book...

شهر كامل بين يدي ليس مللا منها با لانشغالي فأفقدني قليلا تتابع السرد الضروري لربط الشعور. السرد رائع ومحكم وهادئ كالمعتاد ..في طياتها تعاطف واضح طبقي صريح مع الطبقة العاملة او المالكة الصغيرة ضد رأس المال المتحكم .. نقد اجتماعي عال النبرة كالمعتاد .. دعوة للعود للطبيعة والبساطة ونزع القيود المثبطة لهمة الانسان وحيويته ضد الحداثة.
لها عودة بالتأكيد

I understand what this book was trying to do, and that is why it is 2 stars instead of 1 ~ I like the idea of what it tried to do but could not stand the implementation.

This book is entirely composed of massive run-on sentences and paragraphs that go on for multiple pages. Dialogue is just thrown into the massive paragraphs with little indication that it's happening (no quotation marks, just capitalization of the first word of sentences, but multiple people are talking and the only thing separating who is talking is a comma, but ALSO people can talk with commas in their sentences). Online resources try to say that this artistic choice achieves something relevant to what the book aims to stand for, but I heard this author writes similarly in his other works which makes me think it's just an annoying thing he does :)

Basically I was so frustrated with the writing style I could not focus much on the content, and when I did focus on the content it was like 200/300 pages about the main character making dolls or overthinking things like the phone ringing.

José Saramago's The Cave is another superb work of fiction by the Portuguese author. There are five characters: Cipriano, a potter; Marta, his daughter; Marcal, his son-in-law; the widow Isaura Estudiosa; and the dog named, simply, "Found." They live in an unnamed village separated from a nearby city by a "Green Zone" and an "Industrial Zone." After that come the shacks in which live the poor. Finally there is the 48-story complex referred to as The Center, which combines air-conditioned apartments with commercial and recreational facilities.

Cipriano has been producing pottery vessels for The Center on an exclusive contract which is canceled, leaving him without work. His daughter thinks up the idea of producing painted pottery figurines and collaborates with her husband and father on producing samples. But again The Center cancels, saying there is insufficient demand. The potter resigns himself to moving into The Center, where Marcal is entitled to an apartment because he is a security guard there.

At the same time, the widower Cipriano grows increasingly interested in the widow Isaura. And he is adopted by a dog whom he calls "Found." Found is as much a character as any of the humans, and Saramago makes a point of going into the dog's mind as if he were a human character.

With his pottery business in shambles, Cipriano agrees to move into the The Center with his daughter and son-in-law, until a strange discovery on one of the lower levels of the giant building changes everything.

n  The Walln

COMING SOON, PUBLIC OPENING OF PLATO’S CAVE, AN EXCLUSIVE ATTRACTION, UNIQUE IN THE WORLD, BUY YOUR TICKET NOW.

I don’t know why the end of José Saramago’s novel reminded me of that old joke in which a child asks his father why the writers have got street names. In fact I know why – the apparently innocent question hints to the way of reasoning of an entire society whose values have no common point whatsoever with the culture anymore, a pragmatic society that sees the eternal ideas as simple curiosities projected on the wall for its amusement, that does not feel any metaphysical anxiety anymore and it is quite comfortable with the ropes around the neck and feet which keeps it firmly tied to the stone bench of the immediate, the concrete, the consumable. A society forever anchored in the immanence.

I think this is the main theme of The Cave: the chains of ignorance the modern man proudly rattles, deluding himself he freely gave up his past, his inner life, his humanity as liabilities in change for the comfort of civilisation where having is more important than being.

From this point of view, the story of Cipriano Algor, together with his daughter Marta and his son-in-law Marçal Gacho, is the story of the few who still had the curiosity to turn their head to see the light at the entrance of the cave – to realize their limits and to fight to surpass them. In fact, as the narrator informs us right from the beginning (in some ludic reply to Cratylus), ““algor” means the intense cold one feels in one’s body before a fever sets in, and… “gacho” is neither more or less than the part of an ox’s neck on which the yoke rests.” It is Cipriano Algor who will teach Marçal Gacho (as he taught his daughter) to think and see the world as it is, to shake off so to speak the yoke of ignorance and quit the cave.

Or the caves, for there are several, one for each misconception mankind carelessly built to foolishly worship it afterwards, mistaking it for eternal truth. First, there is the cave where Cipriano deposits his unwanted earthenware plates, mugs and dishes, jokingly imagining archaeologists’ controversies over their origin and utility upon its discovery in a distant future – for what is History God other than a bundle of suppositions based on some vestiges that could be no more than jetsam? Follow the cave in the hero’s dream, his kiln cave which reveals his creation dependent not on his skills but on supply and demand – transforming the artist into a slave of the Market God. Then the most frightening of all, the cave of the Centre, a building where everybody wants to live because in there everybody’s dreams of comfort became true and which can be accessed by crossing some “dark, evil-smelling waters” and entering deeply the belly of hell through a Dantesque funnel:

It’s morning, but very early, the sun is not yet up, the Green Belt will appear soon, then it will be the Industrial Belt, then the shantytown, then the no man’s land, then the buildings being constructed on the periphery, and at last the city, the broad avenue, and finally the Centre. Any road you take leads to the Centre.

That is, another god with feet of clay, the Civilisation God. Last but not least, Plato’s cave itself, desecrated in a material world in which it is supposed not to warn and teach but to provide intellectual exhibitionism, for the most powerful god, whose knot is most impossible to untie, is the Delusion God.

Finally, and encompassing all the others, there is the cave of the text the characters must escape from, in order to come and tell us their story, to warn us about another dangerous god, the God of Illusion. For enraptured with the story it is quite easy to overlook the fact that the said story is in fact the wall on which moves our destiny-shaped shadow Plato had already pointed out for everyone to see:

“What a strange scene you describe, and what strange prisoners, They are just like us.”

Just like us. And how many do still feel the need to break free? I don’t know whether José Saramago really shows us the exit, as Jonathan Keats believes in his excellent review. Or if he does, whether there is anybody left to care. It seems to me that more and more of us not only wear the chains with pride but ferociously fight for a place in the cave.

In puro stile da presa diretta, come se fossimo al cospetto di una sceneggiatura già tradotta in movimento, Saramago entra dentro un'azione scenica, imposta un narratore e gli fa traslare il fatto in sé, i protagonisti e i luoghi, imponendosi fin da subito come il detentore della verità. La voce narrante è infatti onnisciente, non tanto perché anticipa fatti o riprende gli antefatti, quanto perché è la detentrice di quella verità cui tende l'intera narrazione: è il filosofo contemplato da Platone, colui che ama la verità e non insegue l'opinione.
In questo romanzo il mito della caverna è alla base dell'intera narrazione e si mostra funzionale all'epilogo della vicenda narrata che altro non è se non un banale e sano quotidiano minacciato dall'aleatorio, dal superfluo, dal ridicolo.
Cipriano Algor è vasaio, ha sessantaquattro anni, una figlia, un genero che lavora in città, nel Centro, vero cuore pulsante dell'attività economica del circondario, e una vicina che potrebbe alleviare la mancanza della sua cara moglie defunta. Si ritrova presto anche padrone di un cane. E sappiamo fin da subito, e ancor prima di lui, che presto diventerà nonno. A fasi alterne, godendo di alcune piccole anticipazioni, ignari ancora gli stessi personaggi, saremo resi edotti anche di altri piccoli fatterelli, che pur carichi di un'implicita drammaticità, vengono affrontati dagli stessi con atavico eroismo misto a pura rassegnazione.
Il fatto che innesca la narrazione, e rompe ogni dimensione temporale e ogni certezza, una sorta di velo di Maya, è la risoluzione unilaterale del rapporto lavorativo di Cipriano con il Centro che non ha più bisogno dei suoi vasi, della sua terracotta, della sapienza creatrice delle mani, della caducità di un oggetto, semplicemente perché la domanda non incontra più l'offerta e il suo prodotto ha cessato di essere concorrenziale. La sua estromissione è graduale, lenta e patetica, metafora della caducità a marcare l'idea che tra un essere umano e un coccio non intercorre differenza alcuna.
“Punto più, virgola meno”, la narrazione scorre compatta in pagine fitte per assenza assoluta di capoversi e per dialoghi espropriati del loro codice interpuntivo, diventa massiva e claustrofobica, scandita da rari eventi che amplificano le conseguenze fino a giungere ad un epilogo che consola e restituisce speranza. Una riflessione più che mai attuale sullo stato del nostro progresso e sulle implicazioni etiche che comporta il rinnegare il passato semplicemente pensandolo come antitetico al nostro presente.

" هناك من يقضي حياته كلها في القراءة دون أن يمضي لما هو أبعد من ذلك. هؤلاء يبقون ملتصقين بالصفحات لا يدركون أن الكلمات ليست سوى أحجار مصفوفة تعترض تيار النهر. و إذا كانت هناك فإنها موجودة لكي نتمكن من عبور الضفة الأخرى. الضفة الأخرى هي المهمة. إلا إذا لم تكن لهذه الأنهار ضفتان و إنما ضفاف كثيرة. و كل شخص يقرأ تكون تلك هي ضفته الخاصة. و تكون له و له وحده الضفة التي سيصل إليها."

ساراماغو أكثر من روائي هذا ما خرجت منه بعد قراءة أولى الصفحات. البرتغالي فيلسوف كبير يصنع من حكاية بسيطة جداً خالية من أي إثارة رواية عظيمة بإطلالته الدائمة على كل فكرة تدور في بال الشخصيات و هي دعوة للخروج إلى الحياة و تجربة كل جديد عوضاً عن الركون إلى الكهف. رواية عظيمة جداً.

Think Plato. Allegory of the cave.

Ok, so we spend our lives staring at the flickering wall of a cave. So, is Saramago imitating that wall with this book? Does he ramble on about the mundane details to illuminate us, to teach us a lesson, to nudge us into turning around; or is he just adding to the flicker? I want to think he's trying to teach us something, but the lesson was lost on me. I thought it was a bit dull, and the naration, focusing heavily on an old potter, seemed to reflect the rambling of an old man past his prime.

I loved Blindness and I expected more from The Cave. I expected illumination. Perhaps I wanted entertainment--a little flicker on the wall of my cave. It didn't do it for me. But I will seek out Plato and see if he can't entertain me between episodes of Lost.

لقد قرأت لساراماجو بعض الروايات ، بلا شك هذة افضلهم ، اولا لترجمة العظيم صالح علماني ، ثانيا لموضوعها الفلسفي العظيم ، ثالثا لقدرة ساراماجو الفائقة علي الامتاع ، ساراماجو و ان كان من اصعب اساليب الكتابة في العالم ، لكنه من اجود الكتاب و اكثرهم خيالا و فكرا ، لهذا و اكثر نحب ساراماجو

خذ نصيحتي هدية، إذا أردت الاستمتاع بقراءة (الكهف) فأرجو أن تتخيل (ساراماغو) يجلس قبالتك، دعه يقرأ عوضاً عنك الرواية، استمع واستمتع، بصوته الأجش وهيئته الوقورة... خذ النصيحة من مجرّب، لا تنهكه بالاستماع، يكفي أن يقرأ ثلاثين صفحة في اليوم. ولو أعجبك الحال فأنصحك أن لا تتردد في سؤاله عن أي شيء، لأنه سيجيب لا محالة: لماذا سبريانو الجور كذا؟ وأين ذهبت مارتا يا ترى؟ هل مرسيال راضٍ عمّا حدث؟ ما رأيك بالدمى الأخريات؟ أو حتى لو أردت أن تسأله أشياء عن خارج نطاق القصة، لأنه لن يتردد في الإجابة عن جميع تساؤلاتك
نعم، إن هذه الرواية هي ساراماغو نفسه، بشحمه ولحمه، بفلسفته وسحره وخفة ظلّه وقابليته السردية منقطعة النظير... لكن، لا أعلم. هناك شيء واحد لم أفهمه حقاً. لقد أربكني قليلاً لو سألتموني، كنت منغمساً في الرواية ومستمتعاً أشد الاستمتاع، ثم على حين غرّة وصلت آخر صفحتين، فاستغربت ما حدث وسألته: "سيد ساراماغو لو سمحت بسؤال، ما سبب تسمية الكهف؟ لأنك لم تقنعني..! هل هذا هو الربط بين كهف أفلاطون وسردك التخيلي؟ لكنه لم يبالي بسؤالي واستمر بالقراءة، عدت وسألته، إلا أنه كان غارقاً بالقراءة حتى السطر الأخير، وهناك توقف، وانتصب وذهب، وأنا في حيرتي ما زلت اسأل: سيد ساراماغو؟ سيد ساراماغو؟

The simultaneous simplicity and depth displayed in Saramago’s writing captivates, as always.

The characters, including a dog, are incidental and intrinsic to his storytelling.

(His nod to Plato, notwithstanding)