"Nobel Prize-winner Jose Saramago's brilliant
new novel poses the question -- what happens when the grim reaper
decides there will be no more death?
On the
first day of the new year, no one dies. This of course causes
consternation among politicians, religious leaders, morticians, and
doctors. Among the general public, on the other hand, there is initially
celebration; flags are hung out on balconies, people dance in the
streets. They have achieved the great goal of humanity: eternal life.
Then reality hits home—families are left to care for the permanently
dying, life-insurance policies become meaningless, and funeral parlors
are reduced to arranging burials for pet dogs, cats, hamsters, and
parrots.
Death sits in her chilly apartment, where she
lives alone with scythe and filing cabinets, and contemplates her
experiment: What if no one ever died again? What if she, death with a
small d, became human and were to fall in love?"
It is an amazing book. I would definitely recommend it. As I would recommend any of Saramago's pieces.
My concept was to grab key elements of the book without giving it away. Therefore the color purple, the typewriter, a man who is blinded (he does not correspond to death's love) and a figure that could clearly not be human because it has no head but still there is something human about it (death).
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