Death With Interruptions ***1/2

By Jose Saramago.
Published 2009 by First Mariner Books.
Copyright , Lisbon 2005.
Translation by Margaret Jull Costa 2008.
238 pages

What I liked about this book foremost is that's it's funny.  A dark humor if you will - gallows humor.  In comparison to the other Saramago book I read, Blindness, I don't remember that one being very humorous.  I could be mistaken - it has been a while.  In fact I am sure that there was some humor in Blindness but I believe it was less frequent and the subject was so grim, that the the humor of the book was not so forthright.  An example (paraphrased) is when Saramago describes death as "working her fingers to the bone".

As usual, Saramago writes in his usual dense and difficult style.  There are long paragraphs, no quotation marks and conversations that  happen in the middle of the paragraphs.  There are run on sentences and punctuation in bizarre places.  This makes it a difficult read.  At one point, Saramago self satirizes himself when the narrator of the book complains about a writer or a poet who writes in the exact same style. 

The plot is sketchy, skeletal if you will, in which Saramago hangs the meat of his philosophising and his musing.  There's very little character development.  It's all allegorical.  The plot is a device in which the author can expound his ideas and theories.  These ideas, theories and musings are all related to what happens in the plot which is about death and consequently about life.  In fact, as much as a it is a book about death, it is also quite life affirming - especially the second half of the book. 

So this is the plot, which may or may not have a spoiler in it.  In some unnamed, but obviously European (sounds like Portugal, logically) country, people suddenly stop dying, which seems great at first but obviously has it's downside.  Saramago spends time discussing governments and communities and institutions by discussing their responses to the situation.  In this part there are not really any lead character.

After several months, when most issues have been resolved by the leaders and the people of this country death changes her mind and decides to allow everyone to die again.  But this time, in fairness to everyone, they get one weeks' notice so as to get their business in order, which also leads to more social problems which the various institutions have to struggle with.  Death gives notice to the these poor souls by delivering a letter on violet colored stationary.  And this is where the first half of the book ends.  The second half starts when one of her (death) letters is returned stamped "Return to Sender".

This letter that keeps being returned to her has death perplexed.  She's never been denied her will before.  She goes to investigate to find that the person who was supposed to die is completely unawares, and is ignorantly getting on with his life.  She spends some time with this man out of curiosity and invisibly to him. She begins to form an affection for him.  Something you don't want to do if you are the cold hearted killer that death is.  Trying to figure out a way to kill this man that defies her letter, she investigates further more and develops a plan, because her job is rife with ritual and tradition, this new incident has her groping for a solution.  The ending of the book is actually sweet and lovely and hopeful.  We are kind of routing for death to escape her destiny.

There are two ways to read a Jose Saramago novel.  You can read it rather quickly and get through the plot devices, which are quite enjoyable, since his plots are very clever and inventive, and glean some of what messages he has to say.  This is how I read the book, stopping several times to backtrack over his philosophising.  I did not try to read and understand every single detail he wrote.

The other way to read the book, is to actually do that.  Sit down and read every passage closely and get a complete understanding.  I would recommend the first way at first.  Then upon a second reading, I would delve into dense and complicated ideas that he proposes.  There's definitely things to discover and rediscover with each reading.  And there's no denying the genius of the man and his ideas.

That said, I would cautiously recommend this book, because it is a difficult read.  I know enough about Saramago, that if I saw a book of his on the shelf, it would not be the first book i would pull, simply because I know how difficult it would be and I would have to be in certain mind set.  That said, the two times I have read him was because i had to and it was some of the best and enjoyable obligatory reading I have done.