The Double [Englisch] [Gebundene Ausgabe]

From the day I discovered BLINDNESS, I have been a great fan of Jose Saramago's work: THE STONE RAFT, THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO JESUS CHRIST, and THE CAVE to mention a few. I picked up THE DOUBLE with eager anticipation and was not disappointed. The pacing is slow and deliberate, the sentences long and convoluted in typically Saramagian style, but this is a book that I simply did not want to put down. Every time I planned to use a chapter ending as a break point in my reading, my eyes continued on almost involuntarily to the next page, my mind not yet ready to let go of the story.

THE DOUBLE's story line is simple, the cast of characters relatively limited. Tertuliana Maximo Afonso is the most ordinary of ordinary history teachers, a divorced, middle-aged man living a stagnant existence: friendless, cautious to the point of near paralysis, afraid of commitment to an inexplicably-attached girlfriend, and overly attached to his own mother. Then one evening, following the recommendation of a fellow teacher, he watches a rented video and sees a minor actor who is a virtual duplicate of himself as he looked five years earlier, when the movie was made.

With this cinematic revelation of a double, Tertuliano Maximo's world is turned upside down. He begins a comically academic process of investigation, even co-opting his girlfriend Maria da Paz into participating while refusing to reveal the reason. The more he learns about his double, the more shocked he is by their clone-like sameness, down to the matching scars on their knees. Once he learns the other man's true name and address, Maximo cannot resist making contact. Upon discovering their identicalness extends even to birth dates and fingerprints, they are joined in a battle for primogeniture, for the right to exist and occupy the one single place Nature intended for just one human entity, at the unavoidable expense of the other. The consequences are both amusing and tragic, concluding with a surprise twist.

It is tempting to consider THE DOUBLE as Saramago's riff on cloning, but such an interpretation seems overly literal and a bit too facile. Instead, the book can be seen as a modern tale of personal identity: who we think we are, who we portray ourselves to be, and who we really are (or if we can ever even discover that).

Once, double lives were the exclusive province of movie stars and politicians, those who necessarily adopted public personas often far different from their private lives. Today, we have ordinary people taking on new identities courtesy of reality television programs. Thanks to the Internet, we can try on and cast off personalities as easily as changing shirts: projecting chosen identities in chat rooms and via instant messaging, living them out as avatars in simulated life games like The Sims, or portraying ourselves as we wish to be seen on personal web pages. In an Internet world, we can be several people simultaneously. Those who "see" us may have no idea who we really are. After a while, we may not even be sure ourselves which identity is the real "us."

In THE DOUBLE, Saramago pries open the lid on modern identity to examine the consequences of a world in which we can be so easily heard without being seen, where we can represent ourselves to be virtually anything we choose to be. It is no accident that Tertuliano Maximo's doppelganger has a successful career as a supporting actor in movies, appearing in one as a waiter, in another as a hotel receptionist, in still others as a croupier, a dance teacher, a theater impresario. Nor is it a matter of chance that Tertuliano Maximo is a teacher of ancient history, a reader about Mesopotamia, burdened by a laughably outmoded first name and an equally out-of-date automobile, so technophobic he is clueless about how to use a computer. Tertuliano Maximo Afonso is no longer a serviceable identity - it's time to discard it for a newer and better one.

For those unfamiliar with Jose Saramago's work, do not be put off in the first twenty pages by his writing style. His prose is full of involutions and convolutions, turning in on itself playfully and wandering about self-reflexively, revealing wry commentaries and sardonic humor along the way. Saramago's writing is meant to be savored like a fine wine, swirled about the mind and appreciated the way we appreciate the brushstrokes of a master oil painter. The result is magical, more than worth the effort. This is a masterful work from a master writer and deserving Nobelist.

Since THE DOUBLE was my first Jose Saramago book, it was eagerly anticipated. I had heard high praise about THE CAVE. The author's name had been mentioned in some surprising circles. So I'm not sure what I expected here. What I got was a book like no other --- in some ways incredible, in other ways bewildering.

Just the lead character's name, Tertuliano Maximo Afonso, strikes a discordant note from the beginning. And Saramago rarely uses less than all three names, and almost never uses the pronoun. He emphasizes the name's rarity first, among many instances, when Tertuliano Maximo Afonso has to identify himself for the clerk at a video rental store. He rents a video from this previously mentioned clerk at the suggestion of a teacher of mathematics at the school where he, Tertuliano Maximo Afonso, teaches history. The video is unremarkable but for one aspect: A supporting actor with barely a speaking part is identical in appearance to Tertuliano Maximo Afonso. Identical.

Tertuliano Maximo Afonso, recently depressed and lethargic --- too depressed and lethargic to extricate himself from a lackluster relationship with long-time paramour Maria da Paz --- discovers a renewed purpose to his days. He embarks on a mission to locate this actor with his face. He muses whether identical looks (right down to years-old scars and mole placements) means identical times of death. He muses about other things, too. In fact, Tertuliano Maximo Afonso muses, it seems, all day long.

Engulfed in his quest for at least a glimpse of his double, Tertuliano Maximo Afonso neglects not only Maria da Paz, who is recently asking some hard questions, but his mother as well, who is also asking some hard questions, just not the same ones. Tertuliano Maximo Afonso's obsession leads him to neglect most areas of his life that do not involve the actor. He may, it turns out, have taken his mission too far.

This is a book to pay attention to. While at first Saramago's style may be off-putting to some (a spectacularly run-on sentence may go on for a full page; paragraphs may go on for three, no quotation marks are used, very few speaker tags, and you will never see a dash or an interrogatory), it brazenly dares the reader to look beyond proper grammatical conventions and simply read the message. It defies all the rules. Saramago has a rhythm to his writing that, once you have it, propels you into the story with enthusiastic speed. THE DOUBLE provides excellent fodder for provoking thought. It is perplexing, comical, even absurd. A guaranteed head shaker.

--- Reviewed by Kate Ayers

"Digressions, incontestably, are the sunshine - they are the life, the soul of reading." - Laurence Sterne.

Believing the above statement to be true would really help a reader enjoy Saramago and I happen to be one of the believers. I cannot think of an author who uses the device of digression moreso than Saramago. For me, the near-constant philosophizing of the narrator and the characters is one of the things that I love the most about his work. This is the fifth Saramago book I have read and it has helped me arrive at the conclusion that he is my favorite living author.

There is no point in my re-stating the plot or storyline because the amazon page itself (above) really provides a perfect synopsis. So do the fine reviews that follow mine here on this page. But here is the one thing that I would ask the prospective reader to ponder...

What would it be like to suddenly find that there is another person in the world that is exactly like you, in every respect? Another YOU! A double. A doppelganger.

In its psychological twistings and turnings and in a writing style that is as wonderful and coherent as it is inimitable and unorthodox, this is the very question that Saramago brings the reader FACE to FACE with!

My initial answer to the question was "Hmmm, no big deal. So what? I have a double. Who cares?" With The Double, Saramago has now blown the lid off of such an easy answer. Sure, the book is not ABOUT me or you, but in Tertuliano Maximo we see shades of who we all are. And the thoughtful (and patient) reader will find that they are drawn into a vortex of identity trauma along with the protagonist himself.

Who AM I, if there is another me?

Be patient with the book, especially if you are new to Jose Saramago... give it time, you will be rewarded. Stick with the convolutions and dialogues with "common sense"... the absolutely crazy ending is worth it all.

Saramago. What can one say? He is the literature teacher's worst nightmare! He does not even use "proper" punctuation. Most conventional rules of writing are thrown to the wind. Like one reviewer noted, J.S. even tells you ahead of time what is going to happen to his characters later on in the story. It is crazy.

Is The Double a good book to start with if you are new to Saramago? Not really, in my opinion. The Cave, or Blindness, would be a better pier to jump off of.

But jump. Do it.

Swim with a partner, if need be.

T.y.L.i.I.