Blindness

by

José Saramago

The girl with the dark glasses is one of the novel’s protagonists; she’s a young woman who visits the doctor for an eye infection (hence her dark glasses) and goes blind soon after. The girl is a prostitute by trade, but the narrator emphasizes that she “goes with a man only when she feels like it” and has chosen this line of work intentionally, because of the freedom it gives her. In fact, she is struck blind while having sex with a man in a hotel room, which she initially views as punishment for her immortality. She is even more devastated upon arriving in quarantine, when she gives the car-thief (who gropes her) a wound that gets severely infected and indirectly leads to his death, but she soon proves to be one of the novel’s most sympathetic and morally conscious characters: she takes care of the boy with the squint like her own son, comforting him when he cries and sacrificing her own food for him, and she develops a loving and supportive romantic relationship with the old man with the black eyepatch, even though he is several decades her elder. She also sleeps with the doctor in a moment of weakness but nonetheless develops a close relationship with the doctor’s wife, whom the narrator likens to a motherly or sisterly figure. Nevertheless, the girl with the glasses also has a pessimistic streak: whereas the doctor’s wife believes that the blindness epidemic must end, the girl with the glasses has no hope until everyone regains their sight at the end of the book. Her ongoing inner conflict represents the perpetual tension between hope and realism, purpose and meaninglessness, and self-preservation and self-sacrifice.

The girl with the dark glasses Quotes in Blindness

The Blindness quotes below are all either spoken by The girl with the dark glasses or refer to The girl with the dark glasses. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Existence, Uncertainty, and Autonomy Theme Icon
).
Chapter 4 Quotes

But this blindness is so abnormal, so alien to scientific knowledge that it cannot last forever. And suppose we were to stay like this for the rest of our lives, Us, Everyone, That would be horrible, a world full of blind people, It doesn't bear thinking about.

Related Characters: The doctor’s wife (speaker), The girl with the dark glasses (speaker)
Related Symbols: Blindness and Sight
Page Number: 53
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 6 Quotes

It was my fault, she sobbed, and it was true, no one could deny it, but it is also true, if this brings her any consolation, that if, before every action, we were to begin by weighing up the consequences, thinking about them in earnest, first the immediate consequences, then the probable, then the possible, then the imaginable ones, we should never move beyond the point where our first thought brought us to a halt. The good and the evil resulting from our words and deeds go on apportioning themselves, one assumes in a reasonably uniform and balanced way, throughout all the days to follow, including those endless days, when we shall not be here to find out, to congratulate ourselves or ask for pardon, indeed there are those who claim that this is the much-talked-of immortality, Possibly, but this man is dead and must be buried.

Related Characters: The girl with the dark glasses (speaker), The narrator (speaker), The car-thief, The soldiers
Page Number: 78
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 14 Quotes

What's the world like these days, the old man with the black eyepatch had asked, and the doctor’s wife replied, There's no difference between inside and outside, between here and there, between the many and the few, between what we're living through and what we shall have to live through, And the people, how are they coping, asked the girl with dark glasses, They go around like ghosts, this must be what it means to be a ghost, being certain that life exists, because your four senses say so, and yet unable to see it, Are there lots of cars out there, asked the first blind man, who was unable to forget that his had been stolen, It s like a cemetery. Neither the doctor nor the wife of the first blind man asked any questions, what was the point, when the replies were such as these.

Related Characters: The doctor’s wife (speaker), The girl with the dark glasses (speaker), The old man with the black eyepatch (speaker), The first blind man (speaker), The doctor / ophthalmologist, The first blind man’s wife, The little boy with the squint
Related Symbols: Blindness and Sight, Cars
Page Number: 242
Explanation and Analysis:

Today is today, tomorrow will bring what tomorrow brings, today is my responsibility, not tomorrow if I should turn blind, What do you mean by responsibility, The responsibility of having my eyesight when others have lost theirs, You cannot hope to guide or provide food for all the blind people in this world, I ought to, But you cannot, I shall do whatever I can to help, Of course you will, had it nor been for you I might not be alive today, And I don't want you to die now.

Related Characters: The doctor’s wife (speaker), The girl with the dark glasses (speaker)
Related Symbols: Blindness and Sight
Page Number: 252
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 16 Quotes

On their way to the home of the girl with dark glasses, they crossed a large square with groups of blind people who were listening to speeches from other blind people, at first sight, neither one nor the other group seemed blind, the speakers turned their heads excitedly towards their listeners, the listeners turned their heads attentively to the speakers. They were proclaiming the end of the world, redemption through penitence, the visions of the seventh day, the advent of the angel, cosmic collisions, the death of the sun, the tribal spirit, the sap of the mandrake, tiger ointment, the virtue of the sign, the discipline of the wind, the perfume of the moon, the revindication of darkness, the power of exorcism, the sign of the heel, the crucifixion of the rose, the purity of the lymph, the blood of the black cat, the sleep of the shadow the rising of the seas, the logic of anthropophagy, painless castration, divine tattoos, voluntary blindness, convex thoughts, or concave, or horizontal or vertical, or sloping, or concentrated, or dispersed, or fleeting, the weakening of the vocal cords, the death of the word, Here nobody is speaking of organisation, said the doctor's wife, Perhaps organisation is in another square, he replied. They continued on their way.

Related Characters: The doctor’s wife (speaker), The doctor / ophthalmologist (speaker), The narrator (speaker), The girl with the dark glasses
Related Symbols: Blindness and Sight
Page Number: 298
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Blindness LitChart as a printable PDF.
Blindness PDF

The girl with the dark glasses Quotes in Blindness

The Blindness quotes below are all either spoken by The girl with the dark glasses or refer to The girl with the dark glasses. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Existence, Uncertainty, and Autonomy Theme Icon
).
Chapter 4 Quotes

But this blindness is so abnormal, so alien to scientific knowledge that it cannot last forever. And suppose we were to stay like this for the rest of our lives, Us, Everyone, That would be horrible, a world full of blind people, It doesn't bear thinking about.

Related Characters: The doctor’s wife (speaker), The girl with the dark glasses (speaker)
Related Symbols: Blindness and Sight
Page Number: 53
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 6 Quotes

It was my fault, she sobbed, and it was true, no one could deny it, but it is also true, if this brings her any consolation, that if, before every action, we were to begin by weighing up the consequences, thinking about them in earnest, first the immediate consequences, then the probable, then the possible, then the imaginable ones, we should never move beyond the point where our first thought brought us to a halt. The good and the evil resulting from our words and deeds go on apportioning themselves, one assumes in a reasonably uniform and balanced way, throughout all the days to follow, including those endless days, when we shall not be here to find out, to congratulate ourselves or ask for pardon, indeed there are those who claim that this is the much-talked-of immortality, Possibly, but this man is dead and must be buried.

Related Characters: The girl with the dark glasses (speaker), The narrator (speaker), The car-thief, The soldiers
Page Number: 78
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 14 Quotes

What's the world like these days, the old man with the black eyepatch had asked, and the doctor’s wife replied, There's no difference between inside and outside, between here and there, between the many and the few, between what we're living through and what we shall have to live through, And the people, how are they coping, asked the girl with dark glasses, They go around like ghosts, this must be what it means to be a ghost, being certain that life exists, because your four senses say so, and yet unable to see it, Are there lots of cars out there, asked the first blind man, who was unable to forget that his had been stolen, It s like a cemetery. Neither the doctor nor the wife of the first blind man asked any questions, what was the point, when the replies were such as these.

Related Characters: The doctor’s wife (speaker), The girl with the dark glasses (speaker), The old man with the black eyepatch (speaker), The first blind man (speaker), The doctor / ophthalmologist, The first blind man’s wife, The little boy with the squint
Related Symbols: Blindness and Sight, Cars
Page Number: 242
Explanation and Analysis:

Today is today, tomorrow will bring what tomorrow brings, today is my responsibility, not tomorrow if I should turn blind, What do you mean by responsibility, The responsibility of having my eyesight when others have lost theirs, You cannot hope to guide or provide food for all the blind people in this world, I ought to, But you cannot, I shall do whatever I can to help, Of course you will, had it nor been for you I might not be alive today, And I don't want you to die now.

Related Characters: The doctor’s wife (speaker), The girl with the dark glasses (speaker)
Related Symbols: Blindness and Sight
Page Number: 252
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 16 Quotes

On their way to the home of the girl with dark glasses, they crossed a large square with groups of blind people who were listening to speeches from other blind people, at first sight, neither one nor the other group seemed blind, the speakers turned their heads excitedly towards their listeners, the listeners turned their heads attentively to the speakers. They were proclaiming the end of the world, redemption through penitence, the visions of the seventh day, the advent of the angel, cosmic collisions, the death of the sun, the tribal spirit, the sap of the mandrake, tiger ointment, the virtue of the sign, the discipline of the wind, the perfume of the moon, the revindication of darkness, the power of exorcism, the sign of the heel, the crucifixion of the rose, the purity of the lymph, the blood of the black cat, the sleep of the shadow the rising of the seas, the logic of anthropophagy, painless castration, divine tattoos, voluntary blindness, convex thoughts, or concave, or horizontal or vertical, or sloping, or concentrated, or dispersed, or fleeting, the weakening of the vocal cords, the death of the word, Here nobody is speaking of organisation, said the doctor's wife, Perhaps organisation is in another square, he replied. They continued on their way.

Related Characters: The doctor’s wife (speaker), The doctor / ophthalmologist (speaker), The narrator (speaker), The girl with the dark glasses
Related Symbols: Blindness and Sight
Page Number: 298
Explanation and Analysis: