Literary analysis of the novel "Blindness"

"Blindness"
A Literary Analysis

We cannot deny how important the sense of sight is. If we were to lose all five senses except one, majority of us would choose to keep our sight. It is through our seeing eyes that we are guaranteed we are alive when we wake up in the morning. It is through our eyes that we are able to get up, brush our teeth, take a bath, see our family and greet them good morning, eat breakfast, and prepare ourselves for our activities for the day. Through our vision, we see the path we are threading, the crossroads and the traffic lights our vehicle is passing, and the slot where we insert our train ticket. Even before going to sleep, it is with our eyes that we brush our teeth, read prayer booklets, and turn the knob in our alarm clock. Seeing has become a crucial part of our routine lives.

We can then imagine how dismayed the persons were as blindness hit them. Not only did they have to recover from the shock in the first seconds, in the next few minutes they equally have to overcome the distressing ideas that race through their minds. If they never see again, their life will never be the same. If it was any consolation, from the moment the milky white sea drowned their vision, the people gradually started disowning their materialism.

The setting of “Blindness” was modern-day; in fact, the first man was seized by blindness in his car while waiting for the green glow of the traffic light. Weeping as he was eased by the other drivers and passersby, the man displayed helplessness and what others may consider a sign of masculine weakness. “I can’t see, I can’t see, he murmured, still weeping.” Here was a 38-year-old man, physically healthy and of perfect vision, being helped by people he barely knew, like a child lost in a shopping mall. Here, the first blind man is the symbol of inferiority—his blindness—and the others were of superiority, because of their ability to see.

It is also in this scene that the car was inadvertently entrusted to the “good Samaritan.” As a first sign of dereliction of materialistic worth, the first blind man’s car, regarded as a convenient means of transportation and worth (no matter the model) at the least, a few thousands of dollars, was consigned to a pure stranger. It is worth noting that the blind man, at this time of grief, could still worry about the valuables in his home. “This zeal suddenly struck the blind man as being suspect, obviously he would not invite a complete stranger to come in who, after all, might well be plotting at that very moment how to overcome, tie up and gag the poor defenseless blind man, and then lay hands on everything of value.” One can assume that the possible run away of his car—which was of great value, too—did not cross his mind. On the greater possibility, it was a sign that on times of tension, material possessions such as the car hold not as much value as the blind man finding his way home. “… all he wanted was that someone might accompany him to the entrance of the building where he lives. It’s close by and you could do me no greater favour.”

On the other hand, the car-thief, who had his eyesight, felt superior to the blind man, for not only did he have his sight, he had made a favor in behalf of the first blind man. With his sight still present, he knew the car’s worth, and felt less bad in taking the car as a form of payment for his kindness. However, conscience got the better of him, and as he got out of the car, he estimated the price he paid in exchange for the blind man’s car, and the car lost its shine. “… just because that poor wretch turned blind is no reason why the same should happen to me… He got out and did not bother to lock the car.”

As the ailment proliferated, its victims became subject to the same inferiority the blind man felt: the thief being delivered home by a police man, the girl with dark glasses being caught naked in the hotel. The ophthalmologist was different. On learning about the disease, he immediately sought an explanation, if not a cure. When the blindness hit him, as well, he remained calm and instead of weeping, he did his best to hold his authority as a man and as a doctor. “…being a doctor, he was not going to surrender helplessly to despair, like those who only take note of their body when it hurts them.”

As more people contracted the blindness, the people saved with their eyesight tried to control the situation. The Government and Ministry, with their position and sight, decided the use of the mental hospital, while families kept their blind indoors. However, it was not long before even the government was affected by the blindness, and the government was no more.

In the mental hospital, the internees were reduced to animals being fed irregularly by their masters. The soldiers were in authority, they had their sight, they bring the food, and they hold the guns. The internees became equal; no one was rich or poor, nor woman or man, young or old, all were recognized simply by their voices—except for the doctor’s wife. The doctor’s wife sought authority in the most subtle way to maintain her secret. In no time, however, she became known in the wards as the one who quickly and easily found her way around, and this gave her the slightest influence over the other internees.

Radicals exist everywhere, and even in the company of blind detainees, some try to recoup their power and dignity by stressing their strength over others. The blind hoodlums did this with a gun, sticks, metal rods, and a great urge to repossess power in spite of their disability. “The fellow with the gun continued, Let it be known... that from today onwards we shall take charge of the food… and anyone who tries to go against these orders will suffer the consequences, the food will now be sold, anyone who wants to eat must pay.”

It is fantastic thinking what the hoodlums wanted the internees’ jewelries and other belongings for. Perhaps they had a spark of hope that someday, when they regain their sight, these possessions can be traded for money and be used for daily living. Or perhaps it was their only way of reasserting their control over their lives (and those of others) in that time of discouragement.

For the blind internees, however, it was not a very difficult choice to give up their possessions in place of food. In that situation of seeming life and death, food is the most important ticket to survival, and surely, what are jewelries worth in that time? “…unless we feel that you have handed in enough, you will simply not get any food and be left to chew your banknotes and munch on your diamonds.” In giving up their material wealth, they not only opted for the most sensible thing to do—to keep what’s essential in life in exchange with what is not as necessary—but also displayed a dim, if not absence of, hope. By giving their riches to get food, they prove that their goal is to survive for the present, oblivious of the future, when they might regain their sight and need their possessions to survive. “I can get rid of this, said the doctor’s wife, and began at once to empty a bag in which she had gathered cosmetics and other odds and ends at a time when she could never have imagined the conditions in which she was now obliged to live.” She kept nothing except a pair of scissors, which gave her hope that her eyesight failed to provide, and served as a foreshadow to the life its blade shall cut.

It is a different story, however, when the thugs demanded the women as sex slaves. Perhaps it is the hoodlums coming into senses that they, too, cannot munch on the banknotes and diamonds, at least for the present. Since they had control and no worries over their food, the thugs reasserted their male superiority as they raped the women and satisfied their carnal appetites.

The world outside the confine was not greatly different from that inside. Blind people groped their way about, forgot etiquette and abandoned values of hygiene, respect, and peace. Outside and inside the intern, blindness has shattered not just the morality of people but also the materialism that has governed over the society of modern time.

Food became the only thing important. Life for the populace has become a search for food, and served no other meaning other than finding food, eating, and hanging on to dear life. Having food meant living, and living meant finding food. Life lost its meaning.

Without the government, several blind citizens gathered in the squares and talked about organizing. It was a sign that in the midst of darkness, some—or at least, an effort to gain—hope was possible in spite of the blindness.

If, in the start of the novel, the first blind man finds apprehension in letting a stranger in his home (when he didn’t worry so much about his car), toward the end, the total relinquish of possessions became crystal-clear perceptible when the general public left their own homes and went, fumbling, in search of precious food. In entering other people’s homes, they were aware that in return, they were surrendering their own homes to their fellow nomads whose houses they were staying in or rummaging through. And not just the houses but also the luxurious cars were deserted and now served as homes. “The cars here are expensive, capacious and comfortable, which explains why so many blind people are to be seen sleeping in them, and from all appearances, an enormous limousine has actually been transformed into a permanent home…”

The blindness that struck the unknown city, though evidently negative, like all other similar tragedies, has a positive effect of challenging authority and crumbling materialism.