Blindness
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Why such disturbed literature for school reading?
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Aria
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Mar 08, 2013 10:19AM
I am curious to see what other people feel about the "classics" students are required to read for school and if anyone thinks it is actually necessary to have our kids read such disturbing and depressing literature in the name of eductaion. Is it truly beneficial to expose them to these images or is it adding to the deep problems our society finds itself in the midst of?
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Of course it depends on the age group doing the reading. Disturbing ideas presented in really good literature is better than the disturbing ideas kids are bombarded with daily -- commercials for movies, games, cage fighting, WWF; bullying; bad teachers; . . . .
how old are these students? the book is excellent but it is disturbing. oth, we are teaching them birth control in second grade; surely this can't be off limits under those circumstances. personally, i think we are also sexualizing our kids too young and exposing them to emotional issues they aren't ready to deal with on a number of levels. we are becoming too politically correct and too progressive to understand right from wrong. we don't allow dodge ball but we do allow birth control for youngsters. something is wrong when a child can't play tag but they can have sex!
Yes. It is important to the cultivation of sensitive, and enlightened adults.
How old are the children being cultivated into sensitive and enlightened adults. Are they old enough to understand the meaning of the book Blindness?
It isn't a book a young reader could manage.
How old are the students reading it? I read it, and I agree, children could not manage it.
So, high schoolers? Perfect age.
What do you think is the goal of the teacher in choosing this book?
Excellence in literature.
Excellence can be achieved with any number of books. Why this book?
This book is very eye-opening and has an extremely important idea / principle behind it..I think everyone should read it, and honestly, I read it as a highschooler and I don't think it was too crude or disturbing nor something a lot of teenagers wouldn't understand, if they tried.Like someone said in a comment above, I highly doubt someone will be shocked with these graphic descriptions, despite them being terrible sometimes. The media and the internet bring images, commercials, ideas, terrifying data that no one avoids.. At least this is cultivating them
Perhaps we should scale back our exposure of these horrible images, perhaps we would have less brutality and fewer murders if we stopped desensitizing our youth by exposure to so much ugliness that it becomes natural to expect it and be unfazed by it.
thewanderingjew wrote: "Perhaps we should scale back our exposure of these horrible images, perhaps we would have less brutality and fewer murders if we stopped desensitizing our youth by exposure to so much ugliness that..."Country in the west with the strongest tradition of banning, censoring or restricting books in order to prevent the moral corruption of children and their exposure to unsuitable content: America.
Country in the west with the murder rate an order of magnitude higher than anywhere else: America.
I'm not saying that to be anti-American. Just to suggest that the 'won't somebody please think of the children' approach has been tried for a century and doesn't appear to work. Why not try doing what they do in countries that already have less brutality and fewer murders?
[For what it's worth, I'm puzzled - I don't remember 'Blindness' being a particularly graphic, or even unusually depressing, book. Certainly I read a lot more disturbing things as a child, but I'm not brutal or violent. Indeed, I think I'm generally more peaceable than people I know who didn't grow up reading widely. Literature is a good way to expose children to unpleasantness - better on the page with meaning and consequences and reflection than in real life, without supervision or control.]
I don't remember it being particularly graphic or more violent than the stuff so popular today, i.e. Django and the vampire movies, etc. Actually, the novel expresses many difficult concepts that could easily encourage good conversation and discussion with a good teacher without an agenda. I am not sure there are many of that kind of teacher today.
In addition, I was not suggesting banning or censoring anything. I am totally against that policy. I was merely suggesting that there may be other more appropriate ways to teach our young adults about good citizenship, compassion, survival skills etc. I am not aware of any particular policy of censoring in this country, though.
The concept I loved in the book was that along with white blindness and the loss of sight, came the loss of certain rather obvious prejudices which could only be a good thing. On the other hand, there was no shortage of anger, fear, or retribution, if I remember it correctly.
Blindness is no more shocking than Lord of the Flies or 1984. It's a powerful book, beautifully written, and one that I wish we'd had when I was in school, the essays would have been far more interesting than the ones I had to write on Portrait of a Lady and Margarat Attwoods SurfacingA child over 13 could process Blindness, especially with class discussion
I am not at all objecting to the teaching of the book, "Blindness". There are also many other worthy books that could be utilized to teach them about life, that may have difficult concepts. I think I really am questioning our approach to our children and their education. Is there any reason why we teach our children about all of the negatives in life before they have an opportunity to simply be children and learn about the beauty around them? Are we taking away their childhoods with their reading material and the choice of subject matter in the schools even as we regulate their choices in food and games?
We pretend they are incapable, unable to make the simplest decisions, yet we are in favor of supporting them until they are 26 with insurance because the prevailing thought is that they are incapable of caring for themselves, we insist that they have the education they want, not necessarily the one they can afford or deserve, without expecting them to earn money to pay for that experience.
Yet, from the earliest of ages, we expose them to all of the ugliness we can, and we even teach them about engaging in sex at an early age, providing them with birth control at a time they should not even be thinking about giving birth. We are over sexualizing them before they even understand the consequences of their behavior.
On the one hand. some believe that they are not old enough to make a simple judgment about a game of tag, and on the other they are old enough to deal with subject matter that could easily be put off until their frontal lobes are better developed. They can't be both children and adults at the same time.
Well, while this is a bit tongue-in-cheek, it is also a serious concern of mine.
Are we exposing our young to subjects they are incapable of handling on the one hand, while we treat them as irresponsible on the other? If so, what lessons are we really teaching them?
So, my initial post, I suppose, was about whether or not Blindness was being taught at an appropriate age, not whether or not it was appropriate to teach it. Perhaps I wasn't clear enough in my statement.
As a dad I disagree with most all of that. I show my kids what's appropriate for their ages and look forward to watching their literate minds grow beyon the Captain Underpants stage we're at now. Blindness is appropriate if discussed, and I'd trust schools to do so for kids of 13+.
We don't expose kids to ugliness, but we can't deny it exists
Why are you up at this ungodly hour? I think you misunderstand me. I don't think we should keep them emotionally immature. I do think we do that on the one hand, but we do not on the other. I am not arguing, I am merely stating a different opinion that has two sides to it. We do expose our kids to ugliness; I simply wonder why we often concentrate on it. Today, even their popular choices in literature are mostly about unusual or abnormal behaviors. Although, today, normal is being redefined.
What happened to books like Black Beauty?
No, we can't deny ugliness. I think acts like 9/11 proved that. I just think we might concentrate a bit more on beauty.
thewanderingjew wrote: "Why are you up at this ungodly hour? I think you misunderstand me. I don't think we should keep them emotionally immature. I do think we do that on the one hand, but we do not on the other. I am no..."We concentrate on that because unfortunately that' the real world, that's life. And as soon as they embrace it, they'll be better prepared for adversities, for loss, for sorrow. You're helping them grow, while understanding the world that surrounds them.
Personally, I think that getting a picture of it this way is better than to go out into life expecting sunshine and rainbows and getting caught off guard without any defences.
If we didn't expose them to so much ugliness as if it was the norm, maybe it wouldn't be the self fulfilling prophecy it has become. Anyway, my point is missed again. We treat then as adults on the one hand while we treat them as infants on the other. That is what confuses people, young adults especially. They are never sure about what is expected of them, but for sure, lately, we expect very little in the way of responsibility. It is just my opinion, not a judgment. I suspect I am a bit more conservative, in my thinking, than many of you.
thewanderingjew wrote: "How old are the students reading it? I read it, and I agree, children could not manage it."It is in a high school curriculum, but personally I do not think this is any excuse. I read a good portion of the book and it has disturbed me beyond words. It scares me to think how far our culture has fallen that it is ok to have teenagers read a graphically sexual novel in the name of literature. I have no doubt that many of these books have meaningful messages, but do we really want the people that will inherit our nation to be filled with images that only serve to normalize violence and dehumanization? I agree with what a lot of people are saying about it being no different from the other parts of media kids are exposed to and I think this makes the situation that much more dangerous. I do not think that this it is right to expose people to this imagery on any level. I am just wondering if anyone can honestly say they would want their child, no matter how old, to read a graphically dehumanizing and nearly pornographic novel in the name of education?
Joana wrote: "This book is very eye-opening and has an extremely important idea / principle behind it..I think everyone should read it, and honestly, I read it as a highschooler and I don't think it was too crud..."I have no doubt that the students who read it at a high school level can comprehend it and are even exposed to things like it on a regular basis, but does that excuse the fact that we pumping our young adults full of inappropriate images and ideas? And then we wonder why there is so much violence and teen depression...
Wastrel wrote: "thewanderingjew wrote: "Perhaps we should scale back our exposure of these horrible images, perhaps we would have less brutality and fewer murders if we stopped desensitizing our youth by exposure ..."In the middle of the book there are brutal and graphically described raped scence. Throughout, there is a prevailing sense of complete hopelessness. Bloody murders along with revolting living conditions are what the book is centered on. In my opinion this book is the very essence of disturbing. What good can come from desensitizing people, not only children, to pervert violence?
thewanderingjew wrote: "Why are you up at this ungodly hour? I think you misunderstand me. I don't think we should keep them emotionally immature. I do think we do that on the one hand, but we do not on the other. I am no..."This is exactly what I am saying. There is no way to deny the evil there is in the world and children will be exposed to it just through living, but is it necessary to immerse them in it through all levels of media? School is supposed to be a place to grow, it is meant to be a safe place. There is enough ugliness in the world without us surrounding ourselves with it in all areas. I do not think that we are keeping kids ignorant to the real world through controlling what they put into their minds when they are young. On the contrary, it gives them a view of the world that is not one of dispair but of beauty so that when they are confronted with such issues, they have a peace of mind to properly deal with it. Growing up, I was sheltered from a lot of the ugliness in the world and I am not an emotionally stunted, ignorant person. I believe myself to be well read and well educated in terms of the "real world" and I know that emoptionally I can process horrible issues that may arise, such as Blindness, but that does not mean I am going to go searching for the grotesque. Perhaps censoring is not the answer, but I do think we should limit the ideas we put into the heads of kids through education and literature especially.
The problem in today's world is that we have begun to make unusual behavior and the macabre seem like mainstream, in the interest of being politically correct, even when the overall effect of these judgments is negative and does nothing to improve anyone's life or situation, but rather by making it so acceptable, we degrade ourselves and our expectations. Although we believe by being "all accepting and all inclusive", We are also self-righteous; we are only fooling ourselves, as evidenced by the state of general decay in our moral and ethical standards and our world, in general. We are merely reaping what we have sown.
What I find scary is the idea of a world where it's NOT considered OK for teenagers to read books with graphic sexual content. That really would be a terrifying place. The age of consent in my country is sixteen, for heaven's sake - if I ever have kids, I'll certainly hope they're read about sex at least a few years in advance!Even more frightening is the more general idea that we should 'limit the ideas we put into the heads of kids'. That's precisely what education and literature are for: putting ideas into people's heads. The best way to make sure people don't pick bad ideas is to make sure they are exposed to better ones. And the best way to make people appreciate how good the good ideas are is to let them compare them with the bad ones. How are children meant to learn to think for themselves and make their own decisions if they are not given any practice at it? Do we keep them swaddled in an intellectual wool of obedience and tradition until they're eighteen or twenty-one or fifty-eight or whenever it is you think people are ready to become independent, and then kick them out and go 'here, you're in charge of sorting stuff out now, sorry you've not had any practice at it!'.
The two most likely outcomes of "controlling what they put into their minds" are that the child grows up to rebel against everything and embrace what was kept from them and fall into terrible ways lacking the experience to know how they are terrible... or, even worse, they end up obedient, and conservative, and repressed simulacra of some inherited ideal.
The best way to learn how to tell right from wrong is to have the opportunity to do so, as often as possible and as young as possible. A parent's job isn't to "control... the mind" of their child, but to teach their child how to control their own mind - and to minimise the consequences of their early mistakes.
I must say, it's been a while since I read 'Blindness', but I don't remember it being "centred on" bloody murders and revolting living conditions and 'pervert violence'. I remember it being about love, forgiveness, compassion, humility, honesty, self-discovery, self-definition, courage, faith, morality, and divine mystery. I remember it being a beautiful book. Sure, the journey along the way is harrowing and horrifying at times... but reading 'Blindness' and thinking that it's a book about dirty and unhygienic living conditions is missing the point. It's having your eyes closed to beauty. Why is it, time and again, that the ones who complain most loudly about how we should avoid the sight of ugliness are also the ones who are most blind to the beauty in front of them? You cannot see beauty if you do not open your eyes to the world. If you try to keep your eyes closed all your life... then when you finally open them all you will see is a terrible and blinding suffusion of white light.
Sure, it's easier to keep your eyes closed, to try to keep your children's eyes closed. But as the book itself says, men do evil because evil is usually the easiest thing to do. Goodness is hard; goodness, and truth, and beauty, are challenging. I think that children should be challenged. Being challenged means that they can fail, they can become overwhelmed by ugliness, by lies, by evil. But being challenged is also how they can learn to become good, and true, and beautiful.
Controlling the minds of children is the highest and most dangerous form of hubris. It's putting yourself between them and all the danger of the world - and in one way, sure, that's great, that's necessary. But we must always remember two things: first, that we cannot protect them from all things forever; and, second, that by putting ourselves in such a powerful position over them, we cannot protect them from ourselves. Trying to limit the ideas children can encounter is what you do when you're certain that you know everything that is worth knowing, are right about all things, and that your children could never know better than you about anything. That is hubris. That's the easy path for you as well as for them: because that protects you from them, from the possibility that they may challenge you, expose you, improve you.
More evil in the world comes from children doing what they are told - and more importantly, believing what they are told - that from children learning to see the world in new ways for themselves, learning to observe, learning to ask, learning not to accept that certain ideas are to be held back from them, learning to tell beauty from ugliness through their own eyes and ears.
This is, I suppose, maybe the point of this book. That's what the epigraph says: if you can see, look; if you can look, observe. In a way, the whole novel is about your attitude toward it. To fail to look, to observe, is to be blind; to fail to teach others not only to look but to observe, is to teach them to be blind. If all you do is see, you are indeed blind. As Saramago puts it: "I don't think we did go blind, I think we are blind, Blind but seeing, Blind people who can see, but do not see." We see the ugliness of the world of Blindness through the eyes of the one woman who is not blind - it is in her account, her sight, her observation, that you find the ugliness that frightens you, that you want to protect people from. If everyone were blind, they would see nothing that could offend them. It is sight that shows us ugliness. And so you advocate for blindness, for putting your hands over the eyes of others as the doctor's wife lays out her images of a blind world; but the novel shows us the evils that accompany blindness - at least, if we have eyes to see and ears to hear!
On a more practical note, I'd like to reiterate that "sheltering" doesn't appear to work. I remember realising this as a child, reading up on drug addiction statistics. I'm from the UK, we've always been pretty tough on teaching children the evils of drugs, keeping them sheltered from them (this was before we even relaxed the laws on cannabis - all drugs were absolutely evil). And the same with alcohol, for that matter. Children, alcohol, kept resolutely apart, if your child so much as sees you drinking you're a terrible parent. And sex? Dear lord, no, none of that stuff please, we're British.
And I remember looking at the Netherlands, you see, just a little way across the channel, similar to us in very many ways. The madmen were allowing people to smoke pot without punishing them! Children could sit where they served beer, they could even drink alcohol legally from something like 12 onward, and at the time their age of consent was 12 too.
And gosh darn it if they didn't have lower levels of drug addiction, of drug use, of teenage drinking, and of teenage pregnancy too!
There's an old and by now very trite saying about giving a man a net and he has fish for life. "Limiting the ideas we put into the heads of kids" and "controlling what they put into their minds" is like saying to the man 'sorry, there are some dangerous fish out there, I can't let you take that risk, here are some fish I caught already'. And then giving him a net on his eighteenth birthday and sending him out into the world.
What I think you should do is teach him how to fish, which, yes, involves letting him have a go himself. And sure, you should be standing right next to him, and pointing out the jellyfish he might want to avoid touching, and untangling the net for him if it gets messed up... but anything other than telling him 'don't you worry about that fishing business, that's far too dangerous for you, only we adults can do that!'.
There's another quote, from another SF book, which springs to mind: "if you try to save wisdom until the world is wise, Father, the world will never have it." Literature is a path to wisdom. Books like this are a path and a guide to wisdom. That is why children should be taught books like this. To show them the ugliness that is a path to the wisdom to deal with ugliness: to show them the wisdom that shows them how to persevere through the image of ugliness to discover beauty.
That's how it seems to me. But like I say, it's been a while since I've read the book. I don't know, maybe I'm wrong, maybe there's nothing beautiful here, maybe it really is just a book about unhygienic and dirty living conditions, and rape. Not sure why Saramago would have written the book if that's what it were centred on, nor why so many people would so viscerally love it, be uplifted by it, be inspired by it. So I think maybe it's about beauty. But hey, you know better than me, I'm sure. You have the benefit over me of a sheltered upbringing. I'm sure it makes you far more able to pierce with charity into the heart of the soul of a challenging book. And if it doesn't... I haven't read it in a while.
Some of our greatest literature could be called "disturbing." If it's not disturbing, it doesn't make us think. This is a really good book and it did indeed disturb me. But I wouldn't think of telling other people not to read it. Young readers can handle disturbing literature if it is taught as it should be taught. We can't let them hide behind rainbows and unicorns all their lives. What is the quote that says all good literature is either about love or death? Life is dark and light -- great works of literature reveal this in many ways.
Wastrel, why have you given up on reading???Permissiveness without guidance is the issue, not censorship. Because a parent prefers a child to read more wholesome novels, does not mean that parent does not teach their child judgment. On the contrary, they are teaching the child that it might be better to choose beauty over ugliness, and I don't mean it in the physical sense, but rather in the sense of character.
No one is advocating censorship. There are age appropriate novels for young adults and there are some that simply are not. It is about judgment. I raised two very healthy children and they are raising their own healthy children now. Mental health is as important as physical health and it is well known that the frontal lobe is not fully developed until the early twenties. Even when the ability to make sound judgments is there, often unsound judgments are made. I would hope that our young are not tempted or taunted by the material they read but rather that their horizons are broadened.
Children do best when they learn that life has limits, and that they can't have or do anything they please. They do well with defined borders for behavior because that is what the real world is like. Slowly, I think the modern parent is beginning to realize that they can't have it all either, and changes will be made. The world is not spinning out of control financially or behaviorally for no reason. We have planted the seeds of discontent. The pendulum will swing back to common sense, someday soon, I hope.
All countries are not the same nor are their demographics, therefore what works in one won't work in the other. Often that plays a large part in the way a book is received and/or treated by all segments of the population.
Why do we have to dwell on the nastiness of society? Why can't we teach tolerance and good behavior in positive ways rather than by exposing our young to the worst possible behavior patterns? Wouldn't it make more sense to sensitize our future adults with kindness, compassion and good will toward each other rather than with murder, rape, torture, war, etc.? Why are all the books preferred by young adults about blood letting, cruelty, etc.? It is probably because that is what we are exposing them to, above all else. When I was young, we didn't even think of or dream up some of the things that are in modern day novels!
A return to common sense rather than laissez-faire, might be in order before all of us make ourselves obsolete and useless with our lack of faith and judgment. We will go in circles on this subject. Some of us believe in sex education in the second grade which is ludicrous, while we condemn a child for playing a game using a gun. Hypocrisy reigns.
Why do we have to dwell on the nastiness of society? Why can't we teach tolerance and good behavior in positive ways rather than by exposing our young to the worst possible behavior patterns?a. Society can be extremely nasty. This is reality, and while living with blinders on might be "nicer" for children, it is dishonest.
b. Tolerance and good behavior absolutely should be taught. By parents and schools both.
There can be balance.
There should be balance, often there is not. As a former teacher, I know from whence I speak. You are idealists and not realists if you think by saying something it will be done. Reality is nasty sometimes, but it is not the norm and by concentrating on the negative, it gives the impression that being out of the mainstream is the norm. That is not balance.
Wastrel wrote: "What I find scary is the idea of a world where it's NOT considered OK for teenagers to read books with graphic sexual content. That really would be a terrifying place. The age of consent in my coun..."I appreciate your honesty and I am sure you are right on many of these issues. Keeping children in the dark about life is not beneficial to anyone, but I do think you misuderstand my point. I have no doubt that Blindness has a deep and meaningful message and that perhaps there is much to learn from exposing yourself to such ideas if only to show you what you do not agree with. But what I find disturbing is the fact that in order to come to these conclusions about what we believe in we focus on the bad. Stories like this do not open my eyes to the beauty in the world, they cloak my vision and blind me to the goodness that there is around me. I find it very hard to see the good when all the messages around me teach me that my world is one of darkness and dispair. This story casts humanity in such a dreary light; in my eyes the characters did not show moral strength in their circumstances. I am not so ignorant as to deny that these people were strong, they were courageous and survived horrific situations that would break most people. However, their actions many times do not speak of the kind or moral strength I am sure everyone wants their children to possess.
I am not suggesting that we ban this book or books like it; just because I do not agree with something like this novel or the messages it teaches does not mean I believe I have the right to tell others what they must do. But I cannot stay silent in the face of so much darkness that is being fed to children who are still growing and still learning about the world around them. Do we want to raise them up from their earliest education with images of a world that offers nothing but violence and despair? This in itself will have repercussions that will shape our world for better or for worse and to be honest, it frightens me to think what will become of us if we do not think it necessary to raise children in light and in beauty. I do not think it is possible to teach the beauty of the world by showing its darkest side and this is exactly what Blindness does if you insist that it is a story about beauty and not ugliness.
So many people have said that it is okay to teach such things as long as it is taught well, but how can we be sure that every teacher in every nation and every school fully understands the magnitude of what they are instructing? It introduces such weighty subjects that cannot be properly addressed in a fifty minute class period in a room full of teenagers who still think it is hilarious when anyone even mentions any part of the human anatomy. This is not the right environment for such things to be processed by young adults. And if said students or parents decide there is something worthy to be learned from a story such as Blindness, that is theri decision and even though I may not agree with it, it is not my place to stop them, but I do not think it should be required reader for a school.
What is the job of a parent if it is not to protect and instruct? I whole-heartedly agree with what thewanderingjaw "Permissiveness without guidance is the issue, not censorship. Because a parent prefers a child to read more wholesome novels, does not mean that parent does not teach their child judgment." Judgement is being able to decipher what is good from what is not and this does not require knowing every evil and every short-coming that the world could possible throw at you.
You say I am being blind by refusing to put graphic images into my head or by sheltering my children from unnecessary grief, but I believe it is blind to think that we can surround ourselves with ugliness and expect to get a beautiful world as a result. This world we live in is magnificent. There is so much beauty and goodness, why do we choose to teach the ugly?
Perhaps this is what is wrong with our reasoning...we no longer believe in respecting the rights of others, or of a higher power, or of limits to what we can and cannot do! Rather, we only believe in ourselves and our own personal objectives...not the greater good! It is no longer all for one and one for all, but rather all for me and sadly we therefore have lowered expectations and achieve lower and less worthy goals. We could throw more money at education and still achieve less, because we expect less and have raised a generation of students who think that just by their very existence they should succeed, not due to their hard work and effort, but just because they think it is their right!. When a President wins the Nobel Peace prize before achieving anything, it says it all. We have pipe-dreams that we consider reality...it is "the emperor's new world" not his false new clothes!Isocrates:
Democracy destroys itself because it abuses its right to freedom and equality. Because it teaches its citizens to consider audacity as a right, lawlessness as a freedom, abrasive speech as equality, and anarchy as progress.
I think this thread is going off on a weird direction. The initial question, I think, is whether young children should be exposed to "disturbing" literature. I would never recommend that children read this book, or any other like it -- not because I feel it is too disturbing, but because they are not sophisticated readers, and have not had enough life experience to understand such things withOUT being disturbed, rather than enlightened, by it. I saw a lot of weird movies when I was a kid, because my mother thought horror movies, or murder mysteries, were fine to view, but not anything with any hint of sex in it. To this day, I love scary movies, but I was certainly disturbed by them when I was a child. Literature like "Blindness" is not for children for a variety of reasons. Older kids, maybe -- if they have a good teacher to talk about it with. Try to focus on these ideas, and I say skip the political diatribes. I don't think that is what this is for.
Saramago is a political being. He has a reputation other than as a writer which I will not go into now, but surely it influences his writing. If you think that Blindness has no political implications, than I must disagree with you. However, the post above was not political, it was an opinion about how we have evolved. It is often a typical ploy to call any idea one disagrees with, political, because it is an effective tool to stop intelligent discussion.
You can substitute any name you like, any philosopher you like for those above. The meaning of the post I believe you are objecting to, was meant to be a statement elucidating the fact that we have become a culture that rewards a lack of achievement, as in everyone getting a trophy so as not to hurt anyone's feelings, as in too much political correctness at the expense of honoring those who truly deserve the honor, as in exposing our children to ideas that are perhaps inappropriate, in the fear that we are not exposing them to everything and that by leaving something out, someone will be slighted.
However, you chose to interpret it the way you did, and that is your right as it was mine to speak my mind as well. I won't speak further as I do not wish to antagonize anyone. I thought we were engaged in a healthy conversation and exchange of ideas which led directly from the conversation about the book.
I didn't say that Saramago's work is not political, because it certainly is. I just saw your comments as political, not having much to do with the topic at hand. If I misinterpreted that, I apologize. I see a lot of that these days, and am weary of it. I like Saramago's work because it is philosophical, thought-provoking and yes, political. Your comments, to me, wandered off into different territory than the issue we initially were discussing. I think we will just waste our energies talking about what we think is wrong with the world -- at least in this forum, I want to participate in other conversations.
After the Holocaust literature I read when I was 10, Blindness would have seemed like a charming allegory.
I find the comments so interesting. We are discussing a book called "Blindness" and yet, so many of us want to remain blind! I guess I was speaking about the appropriateness of behavior, but the eye of the beholder saw politics. In that vein, that person preferred silence to conversation. I have always been receptive to conversation on topics others find uncomfortable. I find it opens up my own mind to different ideas and I welcome them.I will participate in any conversation that comes my way so long as it isn't abusive. However, rather than make people uncomfortable on this site, I will leave you all to yourselves. It has been interesting. Thank you.
thewanderingjew wrote: "I find the comments so interesting. We are discussing a book called "Blindness" and yet, so many of us want to remain blind! I guess I was speaking about the appropriateness of behavior, but the ey..."It isn't a conversation. It's an archconservative screed that everyone has to be silent in front of because anyone who doesn't agree with you can see plainly that you're not going to be convinced. And of course it's politics - the 'appropriateness of behaviour' in society is an expressly political topic.
thewanderingjew wrote: "...filled with images that only serve to normalize violence and dehumanization?"Did you really read the violence in Blindness as "normalized"?
I personally have a hard time believing that many immoral, unethical, or inhumane acts are committed as a result of reading literary fiction. The Wandering Jew inadvertently weakened his own argument about all the "moral decay" in "today's society" when he quoted my favorite Sophist Isocrates. People have been claiming that "today" is so much worse than some Edenic golden past at least since the ancient Greeks. I usually like to press them to be more specific about the decade they see as so much more decent: are they talking whites-only water fountains decent, or slavery decent? Child labor decent or marrying 11-year-olds decent? Legally raping your wife decent, or legally raping your Old Testament dozen wives decent?
Just because the past may have been worse or more corrupt does not justify the immorality today. It is not that literature or even the media that MAKES anyone do anything, but have you never had the experience of reading one too many sad stories or watching a heart wrenching film that leaves you feeling low for any amount of time afterwards? I do not believe it is possible to constantly put corrupt images into someone's head and for that person not to be changed by it. Maybe they won't become that evil that they read, but it would be all too easy for that person's world view to be changed for the worse. I know personally when I read Blindness I did not have any thoughts of going out and committing some of those horrific acts, but it did change me. It is hard to experience some of those events and not feel that the world is a more dangerous place, a place that cannot be trusted, full of selfish people who care nothing for the well being of others. Of course, there are people like that out there, but it is not healthy to look at the world and expect those things because that is what the reader has been exposed to over and over through literature and media, that is what we are subtly being taught through stories such as this one.
Gregsamsa wrote: "thewanderingjew wrote: "...filled with images that only serve to normalize violence and dehumanization?"Did you really read the violence in Blindness as "normalized"?
I personally have a hard ti..."
Personally, I have a hard time trying to figure out why you brought up The Old Testament!
In answer to the main question, I don't believe it should be taught in high school. Nor to I think it, or any other book, should be banned. This novel would be appropriate in a University/College setting, with more mature students who may have been exposed to some of the issues in the novel. Sure, some high school kids could read this and thoroughly enjoy it (I first read it in high school) but there are more appropriate novels that can convey similar meanings than this one. I think this novel would need a comprehensive and engaged audience, and seeing as high school English is mandatory and many students only go in order to get the grade, it's not ideal.
thewanderingjew wrote: "Gregsamsa wrote: "thewanderingjew wrote: "...filled with images that only serve to normalize violence and dehumanization?"Did you really read the violence in Blindness as "normalized"?
I persona..."
I posed several questions in my post. You had the decision to either answer them or focus on the two most ridiculous words in the world.
You went OLD TESTAMENT.
But you didn't answer those questions. Shall we assume that you were capable of doing so with ultimate convincing finesse but you just didn't want to show off?
We should simply assume that I do not respond to rude posts. Your reference to the Old Testament was obvious and rude. I have no real desire to have a conversation with anyone who reduces the conversation to insults.
I read "Blindness" with my book club. It is one of those books that I will encourage my teen/young adult children to read because it was so well written and had so much to think about. Also, I think that books with objectionable content allow us to open discussions with our kids about our value system. It is easy to say you wouldn't, let's say, steal food, but when the situation becomes steal or starve, the lines become a little less clear.
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