The Docters Wife In "blindness" By Saramago

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Saramago's novel “Blindness” deals with a mass epidemic of blindness infecting nearly everyone in an anonymous city. The doctor’s wife, who keeps her sight throughout the novel, can be identified as the protagonist. Her situation of being the only person with sight amongst blind people, is both dramatic and yet classic. It can be linked back to Plato’s “Cave Analogy”, where one philosopher can see the world as it is, while all others only know its shadows. This role has an extraordinary affect on the doctor's wife and influences her character development a lot. This is demonstrated through developments in her significance, view, actions and emotional reception to her own situation. From the beginning of the novel, Saramago portrays the doctor's wife to be a very significant character. Like her husband, the doctor's wife is introduced as a person of high moral values, which contrasts to the characters of the car thief and the prostitute. She is very caring and gentle with her husband. A demonstration of this is that she refuses to abandon him when he goes blind, despite the risk of infection. This not only shows her love for her husband but also demonstrates her lack of fear or her courage at the prospect of turning blind. This is foreshadowing, as later in the novel the inmates discuss what made them go blind. An anonymous voice states “fear struck us blind, fear will keep us blind.” This links back to the fearlessness the wife displayed. The fact that the doctor’s wife is the only known character to keep her sight throughout the novel raises the question: “why her?” Although the allegory of fear causing blindness might portray the doctor’s wife to be very deserving of keeping her sight, an exact reason is never given. However, due to her sight, she develops a stunning amount of insight in the novel, which Saramago contrasts with the other character’s both
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