[Discussion 3/3] (Discovery Read) | Death with Interruptions by José Saramago | Ch 11 - End

[u/IraelMrad]

Welcome to the last discussion of our Discovery Read! We have followed death and met humanity through her eyes, while being accompanied by some wonderful music by bach. How has this experience shaped her?

🎼 Check the dates of the discussions in the Schedule

🩻 Find the Marginalia here

As usual, there will be questions in the comments, but feel free to bring your own prompts!

[u/IraelMrad]

1. How does the relationship between death and the cellist develop? What is it about him that allows her to see a new aspect of life?

[u/Coffee_fuel → u/IraelMrad]

I (personally) don't think there's anything quite that special about the cellist; perhaps part of the point is that he's a fairly ordinary individual. He simply appears to be the first human being death has so heavily focused on, made an effort to get to know as a person, owing to their unusual circumstances (and has allowed herself to be known by him in turn). She's been exposed to all manner of exceptional humans; what she lacked was participation, interaction, a reason to be personally invested and disengage from the routine of her function. They both also come across as deeply lonely individuals who easily fixate on the other; but there are perhaps some light parallels in their day to day "life", the empty apartment, the routine performances and invisibility to the crowd, the scythe and the dog.

[u/psycho4icecream → u/Coffee_fuel]

right and i feel like it's j curiosity at first which turns into a kind of gentle obsession i feel like. once she starts j watching him live i.e. sleeping in his pajamas, walking the dog, rehearsing the piece over and over. i think the real turning point was when the dog curled up on her lap, it's described as the first warm thing she's touched ever but it's j ordinary tactile life that speaks out to her

[u/Comprehensive-Fun47 → u/psycho4icecream]

I do think death became somewhat jealous of humans and she was lonely. I thought the book might explore how it feels to be the one to kill humans. That must take a toll on death, if death is an individual with thoughts and feelings.

When she's watching him sleep and observing his routine with the dog, it definitely felt like she wanted to be a part of those simple parts of humanity. death never sleeps. That's gotta suck! No pets either, unless the scythe counts.

[u/Comprehensive-Fun47 → u/IraelMrad]

I guess he's special because he evaded death. His letters were returned.

I was theorizing that he was also a supernatural type being like death, living as a human. They said something about him being 500 years old. I thought maybe he was able to cheat death because he's not actually human, whether he knows this or not, and she's drawn to him for that reason.

[u/IraelMrad]

1. In the second chapter of this section, there is an argument that humanity must be considered as a whole, with dead and living people together. Why is that? Do you agree?

[u/maolette → u/IraelMrad]

This is so interesting because yesterday I was talking to my kiddo and mentioned the word 'people' and he was adamant that when I say 'people' I should mean both those who are living and those deceased, like by default. He didn't even read this book, what is going on?!

I think this argument holds up when the first couple parts of the book are considered. When death stops so much about the daily lives of the remaining living were impacted. You'd think that starting death again would correct those impacts, but instead it just shifts them, places them in a different context. Grief goes back to being grief, those stuck between life and death fully perish, and the living are forced to continue living with the memories and feelings of those they've lost. In a way, the living are burdened to live on with the dead inside them forevermore, whereas the dead are free from this.

[u/psycho4icecream → u/maolette]

i agree!! like when death functionally stopped, there was no real boundary between the "alive" and "dead" because people were in a state that was neither so they basically remain socially and legally active at least in the beginning of the novel. so the dead rlly j change status within the system but they're never actually able to leave

[u/Comprehensive-Fun47 → u/IraelMrad]

People who died are still part of humanity. I would agree.

[u/IraelMrad]

1. We learn more about the way death actually does her job. Was there any part that you found particularly interesting?

[u/AngryBiker → u/IraelMrad]

I liked how the scythe is a separate character she has interactions with.

[u/Don_Quixotel → u/AngryBiker]

I found the talking scythe really interesting as well

[u/Comprehensive-Fun47 → u/Don_Quixotel]

And funny how she wasn't quite aware that it could talk back until it did. It was kind of a bizarre scene though. It felt like a cartoon. "hey, scythe, hold down the fort while I'm gone." "ok, boss." It was so random.

[u/Impressive-Peace2115 → u/Comprehensive-Fun47]

Especially since earlier it seemed to be implied that the scythe couldn't talk.

One wouldn't expect a scythe to respond, and this one proved no exception.

[u/Coffee_fuel → u/IraelMrad]

I loved the idea of rooms filled with paperwork of the dead that are being constructed deeper and deeper "on the way to the fiery center of the earth, where all this paperwork will one day burn", haha.

I was also quite tickled by the idea that she's a minor death, since she's in charge of a puny amount of lives, compared to her sisters. How true!

[u/maolette → u/Coffee_fuel]

I liked the concept of multiple deaths as well, made it feel more believable! It also lends some interesting ideas about the needs of a character like death; rather than being the ultimate one Death, it's a subset of the process and pushes us to feel more of a sense of humanity from her we might not otherwise.

[u/Coffee_fuel → u/maolette]

Yes, and in regard to this, I also appreciated how she lightly recontextualized it by referring to her sisters as the parcae, since historically both Roman and Ancient Greek deities (and associated mythical beings) were depicted as much more individualistic, "human" and prone to fallibility compared to Abrahamic tradition.

[u/IraelMrad]

1. The book has a shift in tone, as the second half focuses on death herself rather than the country where the story takes place. Do you find this shift effective or too sudden?

[u/maolette → u/IraelMrad]

This shift was so sudden and literally made no sense to me. I'd read another section similar to the first two parts or a story (maybe a short one) about the last, but putting them together made zero sense to me. I also hoped there might be some callbacks or more context for putting them together but didn't find that either.

[u/Maxvy66 → u/IraelMrad]

For me, it was very ineffective. The first half was good and interesting. We learned a lot about how a world without death works, even if it often focused on minor details of particular industries. After death returned, I feel like the book lost its plot a bit, and even more so in the last part we read this week.

Explaining in detail how death sends her letters, how she can take a vacation, how she can rent a room or take a taxi… that was too much for me, and I truly didn’t care that much. The cellist was also a pretty boring guy. Nothing wrong with that, but he never really captured my attention… I was hoping to learn something exceptional about him in the end. I’m a bit disappointed by the last part and its tone.

[u/Comprehensive-Fun47 → u/IraelMrad]

It felt like a different book. My thoughts on it are still settling. On one hand, I was enjoying the book all along, even though I found it odd and unpredictable. I kind of lost interest once the character of death was revealed. It was still unpredictable and I didn't really "get" it. At the same time, I liked the character of death and was happy to read this story of death falling in love with a human. It just felt like a different book and if there was some kind of message, I'm still trying to figure it out.

[u/Impressive-Peace2115 → u/IraelMrad]

There was a bit of foreshadowing by the narrator that made me think there would be a shift like this, but I can't find the line.

[u/IraelMrad]

1. What do you think of the ending? What do you think was the message that the story wanted to convey?

[u/Coffee_fuel → u/IraelMrad]

I'm not sure there was anything quite as neat as a message in it (outside of the obvious need for death to function as it does, a natural mechanism that works independently of emotional appeals), so much as many potential points for reflection and satirical commentary.

I did find it interesting, and a little funny, that humanity was completely at the mercy of death throughout, trying and failing to manage the incomprehensible and impossible via bureaucracy; then death introduces bureaucracy of her own free will into what had apparently been an automatic system, only to be brought down by a small, unexpected error, or bug (sorry). She'd held herself so far apart from humanity, yet ended up following one of the most archetypical, conventional love story trajectories ever written by mankind—and the moment she finds herself to be more personally involved and becomes more human is the moment she fails to do her job. Though the finale is quite open-ended, and it could very likely just turn out to be another "interruption".

[u/Comprehensive-Fun47 → u/Coffee_fuel]

Though the finale is quite open-ended, and it could very likely just turn out to be another "interruption".

Great thought. The book ends the way it starts. The disappearance of death at the beginning is undone somewhere in the middle when death (the character) decides everyone who was supposed to die will die at midnight and from this day forward everyone will get one week's warning on their death. Then at the end she's in love and either distracted from her duties or unable to carry them out. How long will that last? Will she bring back the one week's notice? What's the next thing she'll tweak about death?

[u/IraelMrad]

1. What is your overall impression of the book? Did you like it? How much would you rate it? Who would you recommend it to?

[u/AngryBiker → u/IraelMrad]

It was an amazing experience to read this, this is my first Saramago and I read it in the original language, it was quite challenging due to the way of writing and no translation to make it more accessible. His way of writing is very raw and dynamic, he can convey poignancy and humour in a very unique way.

The premise of the plot is what made me interested in reading it and it didn't disappoint, the shift on the second half can put some people off but for me it was a good device to convey the "humanity" of death itself.

[u/Coffee_fuel → u/IraelMrad]

I was a big fan, I suppose I would rate it a 3.75/5? I do wish the finale had been a little more substantial, but I did enjoy how it retained the mundane angle to the end, even in the way it approached death's descent into humanity and their banal love affair; which contained elements of oddness yet at the same time felt extremely stereotypical and unavoidable.

[u/maolette → u/IraelMrad]

I was strangely compelled to keep reading this even though it didn't always make a ton of sense to me, so I suppose that's good! I liked the meta commentary of the first 2/3 even though that's not really how the book is billed, but the shift in the last 1/3 was so weird I had a hard time saying I fully enjoyed it in the end. I'd separate the two, if I were an editor. That said, I rated it a 4/5 because I had a hard time putting it down even when I didn't fully grasp what was happening or why. Something about the writing really drove me on.

[u/Don_Quixotel → u/IraelMrad]

I’ve only read one Saramago and it was Blindness. I still have PTSD from it. It’s horrific (in the best way).

At first, I thought this was too similar? Oh a catastrophe strikes all of humanity at the same time and we have to read about the aftermath? Then I realized I was wrong. First, it wasn’t all of humanity. Second, things got restored fairly quickly. Third, it took a rather fantasy-like turn with death personified. Fourth, the tone is just completely different. It was outright silly at points. I was also reading Pratchett’s Mort at the same time and was funny noticing some of the similarities.

Overall, I gave it a 4.25 on Goodreads (yes you can do quarter and half stars now!). I throughly enjoyed it. I do think the ending was a bit weak though.

[u/Maxvy66 → u/IraelMrad]

I was excited to read this one because I loved Saramago’s novel Cain when I read it in a university course… but Death with Interruptions wasn’t as good, I think. The first half was promising, but the ending was meh for me. I really preferred the reflections on a world without death and its implications over reading about death’s clichéd love story. I’d give it maybe a 2.5/5, I think.

[u/Comprehensive-Fun47 → u/IraelMrad]

Undecided. I didn't find it difficult to read. It gave me some stuff to think about. Some parts interested me more than others. There was some good humor, but it didn't all hit. I didn't find the satire extremely biting or insightful, just kind of amusing at times. Some of the writing was pretty.

I think the concepts were very interesting, but it was a strange book that went in the most random directions. Every time I'd think oh this is going somewhere interesting, it wouldn't go there.

I had so many questions like why introduce death as a character? Why is she a woman in her 30s? How did she become death? Will she be death forever? Were any of the other deaths mad at her for messing with things in her country? Why spend all that time on the minutae of government and economics just to turn the last third of your novel into a cliche romance?

It's considered a philosophical novel, but it didn't try to explore anything about free will. Except the free will of death (the character) maybe. If your death one week from now is a freak accident, finding out it's predestined and unavoidable is terrible.

It definitely felt like a stream.of consciousness novel, not something that was well-planned.

I think the concept of death disappearing or death sending one-week warning notices offers so many avenues to explore, I would be interested in reading a totally different novel about that. I'd probably prefer one with more plot and characters. This was interesting though.

[u/IraelMrad]

1. Are there any quotes that you particularly enjoyed that you would like to share? Is there anything else that you would like to discuss?

[u/Coffee_fuel → u/IraelMrad]

I wonder if the registrar who was mentioned at one point was the main character from one of his other novels, All the Names?

[u/IraelMrad]

1. In the first chapter of this section, the author describes the differences between god and death. What is the relationship between these two entities? What do you think the author wanted to convey here?

[u/Comprehensive-Fun47 → u/IraelMrad]

Honestly, not sure. It was kind of murky. There are a lot of questions about how this universe works and how all these players interact. For example there are other deaths, but do they ever hang out together? How did they get their jobs?

[u/IraelMrad]

1. What is the first reaction of death as she finally meets the cellist?

[u/maolette → u/IraelMrad]

I can't even really decide how she was feeling at first, it almost felt like she was curious about how he had avoided her endeavours but also was angry about it or more forceful in wanting to make things right? It was hard to tell exactly how she was feeling initially.

[u/psycho4icecream → u/IraelMrad]

honestly i thought she was disappointed like he's this one unkillable man so you'd expect him to be extraordinary but instead he's j an everyday man who's wearing pajamas and living in a v fixed daily routine w his dog

[u/Comprehensive-Fun47 → u/IraelMrad]

She's trying to figure him out and figure out why she's unable to deliver his death letter.

[u/IraelMrad]

1. If you had to choose a piece of classical music or a song to paint a portrait of you, which one would you choose?

[u/psycho4icecream → u/IraelMrad]

this is such an interesting question!! in my southern gothic era so ig Strangers by Ethel Cain, j that recurring feeling of continuously trying to be good and wondering if it's enough