The Double (2002)

By José Saramago . Translated by Margaret Jull Costa

304pp, Fiction

Notes

2025-10-19

Saramago is always good, but this is probably the novel of his I have got the least from. As always Saramago procedes gently forward narrating the events of his fable from a strange position of both naivety and wisdom. There's laughs along the way but the climax is tragedy.

Le Guin writes in her review of The Elephant's Journey

To [Saramago]] "man" is not the sole subject of human interest, in whom all value and meaning inheres, but a member of a large household. Saramago's reminder to us that we aren't the be-all and end-all of creation is, usually, a dog. I developed a simple ranking system for his fiction: the books with a dog are better than the ones with no dog; the more important the dog, the better the book.

I think this is correct. The Double does have a dog in it but it makes only a brief appearance.

here's a thing i posted under a youtube video (which I only watched the first 20 minutes of) comparing the book to a film based upon it

I finished the book last night, and was unaware of the film till I stumbled upon this video. I think we have to take the events narrated in the book as literally true albeit impossible. Saramago's books feel to me like experiments: he breaches reality in a specific way and then we see what happens, a weird mix of allegory and realism (i know people say he's a magical realist but to me he feels quite distinct from most authors writing in that tradition).

Some scattered thoughts/ things that struck me/ things that felt important to what Saramago might have been getting at ...

I think it's important that Claro (clear, transparent) is an actor, one who inhabits different roles, and in a kind of reversal at the end of the book Afonso inhabits the role of Claro. Further, the suggestion is that another double is now going to challenge for that role (has this happend before perhaps?).

Helena seems remarkably chill about the whole thing, she's depressed/ anxious thoughout the book but seems on some level to look forward to her new role helping Afonso become Claro.

Afonso seems more bound up in community and life than Claro ever does. Afonso is kind of disipated and depressed but he eats with colleagues (who value him), he phones his mother, talks to his neighbours, has a dog. We never see that kind of thing for Claro, he feels more separate from society, more individuated (an ideal Western citizen?).

After meeting his double Afonso feels the value of what he has in his life where Claro feel the hollowness in his.

When Helena sleeps with Afonso she feels an unexpectedly deep connection. Maria da Paz on the other hand reconises Claro for what he is.

hmmm...

Watching the aformentioned video I'm struck by how the presenter is totally tied up in trying to understand how the book can work in the real world; are they the same person? is the book being told backwards? this feels fruitless. I don't think Saramago's not a tricksy writer, he's precise and straightforward.What is frutiful is to consider his books through a political lense (Saramago was a communist/ anarchist), this is an obvious approach with things like Seeing but I think it's equally useful here.