Blindness

For me, some parts sound like kind of a poem. For example, "we ended up putting our conscience.... verbally trying to deny" pg 17. I also refer this to karma because the men were the second one who got blind and my first thought was that it happened because he stole the car.

Blindness/bird box

Blindness is similar to bird box because it is a spreading disease but the difference is that in bird box when people got blind they kill themselves or others. While in blindness does not have that effect. In bird box in order to survive people pretend to be blind by covering their eyes. This part is similar to what the doctor's wife was doing because she is pretending to be blind in order to help the one she loves. In bird box, they do not lock people in hospitals but sometimes they have to be in close doors because is dangerous outside. In both stories, there are a group of people that stay together and try to help each other.

Blindness

I notice that when someone is not able to see they focus on other important things beside appearance. The woman with the old man was an example of this statement. If she was not blind then the chances of paying attention to him would be low.

Meaningful Quote

"The difficult thing isn't living with other people, it's understanding them" Jose Saramago

I really like this quote because every time I read it the first person that comes to my mind is my father. Once he told me it is easy for you to want people to understand you but what is really courageous is to move aside from your needs and try to understand the other person.

Shock

One of the shocking parts for me was when the doctor's wife enter the church and saw the statues and paintings with their eyes covered with white. It was really dramatic especially for me that has not a great view towards the church.

Class

I liked the last day of class because it was nice to see everyone and listen to what they had been working for a whole semester. I really like the professor was very respectful with everyone's topic and gave full attention and importance to each of us.

Blindness

In the book Blindness we can see the importance of belonging and home. In order to survive in that place they had to make some rules for everyone to follow. We were able to see how frustating and unhappy a person can be in a place they don't belong and that there is nothing like home.

Reflection

Of all the readings in class on the last day. I loved the poem about growth the most. I found it be a very creative and meaningful one. Hats off to the writer. As it pertains to how much work I have produced, I would say it was a lot. I normally would write a lot but doubt it would be so much anyway and I used to love reading but not now as in my part so while it was required I must say I am proud of myself for reading 3 books in the space of a few months. There were times when I did not get to read the book up the the amount of pages required of me for the given class period but I did not take it for granted to not bother read it. Though I should have read the pages for a given class whenever I would read I would continue to catfish up on what I should have read. I didn’t take it up myself to just skip it and move on. I am happy for the experience even though at times I felt like I couldn’t go on. I can say I finished the work. I don’t feel like I did my collection perfectly which would be my fault but I still tried to do it. I can only put measures in place to continue striving to be the best version of myself.

Final thoughts

Overall I really enjoyed this class and what it had to offer to me as a growing student. It's weird to comprehend and accept that this will be my last English class but still happy that I spent it with a fun class such as this. From reading books of poetry to teacher-student scandals and into disease territory, each piece of work that was read in the class had an impact on me and showed me how the human race can act in negative ways, unfortunately. Like how the professor slept with his student and how the government herded the infected like a flock of sheep to keep themselves safe. This class has taught me a lot that I will carry onto the future. Thank you so much Professor Talbird 

What I still need work on

One thing I would still like to work on is to write long essays and stories. I want to start to write more and being more detailed. A lot of the things I have written are not as long as I would want it to be. Prior to this class the most writing I did was like 5 pages. From being in this class has made me want to write more. I would like to go as far as to writing my own book. Hopefully I start as soon as summer begins.

Final class thoughts

One of my favorite things about the class was the group critique. I normally don’t like working in groups because I never really found it helpful because I would just get distracted. However this group         Work was very helpful because people actually took the time to read your work and said what they thought about it and what could be done to make it better . I never liked other people reading my work other then the teacher but I was kinda nice sharing different kinds of information with other students and have them learn something that they may have never thought of certain topics, so it was interesting to learn about different topics.

Some of the text I liked from the readings done on the last day of class was the topic about growth, the text about dreams and paranormal stories. I also admired the text relating to science fiction( where the characters are travelling to new planet) this story was not read on the last day of class but was read during group critique. It as actually written by Andrew . I have definitely never written this much before which I believe was a challenge that drove me crazy somedays. But in the end motivated me to think and work harder Which I really appreciate.

At the beginning of this class when I got to know about the fifteen page collection I got a little scared since I don't really like to write much. However I am proud of myself for finishing and submitting on time and having all the work required. This class was a big change for me with English, I was introduced to new text that helped me look at situation on a deeper level and build my analyzation skills. I learned a lot about writing poems and analyzing paintings. At the end the collection was finished, mainly because of the feedbacks and guidance I received from Prof Talbird and my group members. My favorite text that we have read was the novel Blue Angel by  Francine Prose. And lastly my main goal was to read more which I think I haven't accomplish but going forward I will put more time into reading.

How do you feel about your final collection? Have you ever written so much before?

I felt that my final collection could've been a lot better towards the end I was just rushing to even get it finished. If I had put some more time and energy into it I think I would've been more proud of the work I produced. I also thought that I should've written in different genres that I'm more comfortable with so I could've easily conveyed my message to the reader. I have written that amount before in my free time but not all surrounded one topic like we did.

What do you still need to work on? What was your favorite text that was read on the last day of class? Give a shout out to your favorite fellow writers.

One thing I want to work on is a personal project of my own. Possibly during the summer, I would like to start writing scripts for funny stories, somewhere along those lines. My favorite text that was read on the last day of class was by Salomee, as of right now the title of her work escapes me but I clearly remember the main idea of it, it was about how immigrants are separated from their own families when trying to escape and move to a better country.

What were your least favorite? What did you learn?

Definitely, my least favorite thing about this class has to be the blog. It's not I don't like typing it out and doing that work, but it just seems very easy to forget at points. And when you do happen to remember it would Sunday morning and there isn't anything that could've been done about it. If we had to hand in physically weekly answers to questions that were posted and that would count towards blog credit it wouldn't really be as hard to forget. One of the most important things that I learned in this course is how important literature can be outside of the classroom. It tells stories in short stanzas like poems or in very interesting books, not only reading it is important but also writing it helps as well. 

Favorite Aspect of the Class

There were several aspects of the class that I liked. The class discussions allowed us to speak our opinions and let us be heard by our other classmates. Also, it lets us see if someone among us had the same interpretation of what we were discussing at the time. It broke some individuals out of their shells and allowed them to communicate with others which can be very helpful. Another aspect of the class that I enjoyed had to be the group critiques we had on Thursdays. This didn't only allow us to have our work be read by others but it let us have a steady workload for the Final Collection and we were able to hand it in easily if you did work for every Thursday.

Final Week

This week of the blog is optional. Anyone who posts will get extra credit. Some things you may want to write about:

• What were your favorite aspects of the class? What were your least favorite? What did you learn? What do you still need to work on? 
• What was your favorite text that was read on the last day of class? Give a shout out to your favorite fellow writers.
• How do you feel about your final collection? Have you ever written so much before? 

Blindness Message

Throughout the novel I always had this thought in the back of my mind as to why the author made the book, and why there was a movie adaptation of it. If we take a couple things into account, this might make more sense to whomever reads this. First, we have the government who is the leaders of this quartine. next we have the guards who seem to have not been affected by this blindness. If we take a step back and look at this whole thing as a bigger picture... it almost seems to me that we as a society are messing up our planet, and some higher power above us is making us blind, just to make us aware that we are blinded from our own mess that we have created. I'm not sure if that is the message that is intended, but it does seem to me that it could be a message.

Blindness Final

After reading the book it seem to make somewhat sense to me. Hundreds of people lose their eyesight due to a disease most of them get locked up and being boxed in a room for months at a time can drive people insane. But looking at the movie itself it just seems crazy how losing one many functions that a human body is able to do can really change people and show you their true colors. They took the infected and with no consideration threw them into a prison and not caring of the outcome of what happened, maybe the government made those wards from the beginning just to kill off who was infected just to get the problem out of the way.

Blindness the movie

The movie and the book play out the same, in the movie I felt was more visual from the book in some parts. When the movie started i didn't expect the first blind man to be Japanese but the thief who took him home fit the part because he looked sketchy to me. When the girl with dark glasses goes blind it's crazy to me because she's having a great time living her best life and BOOM right after she goes blind I would be so mad.  Another thing is when every started to go blind i noticed a bell rings and even when they're interacting with each other. The painting we viewed in class last Tuesday with the men following behind each other into a ditch was well represented in the film but the only difference was the women who could see was leading them to success not failure. What I take from the movie is that everyday we wake up taking our sight for granted. We never know one day we wake up this story could happen to us and it's kinda scary. Going on from this some people may realize that we shouldn't take things for granted because it can be swiped away from us any second.

blindness movie

The blindness movie to me was interesting and scary at the same time. I don't think I ever watched a movie like this. All of the scenes was so detailed that everything felt so real like it was happening in real life. The doctor's wife was not what  I was expecting. Honestly I was kinda picturing her to be afraid for her life. But her being the only one that can see gave her the strength to be the heroic one and lead everyone else.

Blindness Screening

In the movie, I noticed that every time the camera would switch off to the white screen you can hear like some sort of bell in the background. It would mostly happen after someone would talk in a conversation. I think the meaning on the bell was to indicate that we were going to look from the eyes  of one of the blind person and not the doctors wife.

Blindness-Movie

The movie was very disturbing but I guess that is a good thing because we really get a feel of what it must be like being in the blind people's position. the effect of the white blankness really allows you to see what the blind people "see." To me the whiteness accompanied by the background sounds in the beginning of the movie gave me peaceful vibes even though they were all disturbed. They were a lot  of scenes taken out in the movie and some were changed as well. There was extra dialogue like when the girl with the dark glasses is talking to the doctor and makes him feel better which leads to sex. I remember in the book there was only sex. The doctor's wife finds food in the basement of the supermarket and people catch her and fight her for the food. That was not in the book, she safely came out with the food. The doctor accompanied her when in the book she went alone, got lost, found a map and then got to her destination. The scene where the man with the eye patch is bathing and the girl with the glasses helps him, shows that they both know who their talking to but in the book the man with the eye-patch didn't know who came and washed his back. The cause of the blindness was not known but I think from the church scene where the doctor's wife sees paintings and statues having their eyes covered gave the story a religious view point. It didn't seem like a disease. it was more of teaching people a lesson: valuing your eyesight, showing people how selfish we are, that there are some who are selfless, how weak we are without the blessing of sight.

Blindness Film

Overall, I feel like the film was spot on to the book and most of everything was on point. I never really imagined the characters to be a specific way or imagine where they’re from and all of that, since in the novel there’s no names for them, it tends to make us focus on their significance, they’re role, and they’re purpose throughout the book. I feel like in the film putting the blank white screen really gave us a feel to that whiteness color that all the blind people see, And also I feel like the film really put emphasis on how big of a role food played throughout this novel, portraying the men getting they’re sexual needs from women, and the groups of people going to hunt and find wherever the food is. In addition, in the end only one man regains his sight, however in the book people from different housings, people from the street, and several people are screaming how they can now see.

blindness

Blindness screening 

I think from watching the move you could see the blindness the characters experienced in the film because the camera would have white screen before showing the characters and the setting their in. Also from the movie compared to the novel there were a lot more details that didn’t happen but for me it painted a really good picture from what I read in the novel 

Film-Blindness

I have grown to realize that throughout the film the atmosphere was set with whiteness and blurriness  being in effect throughout different scenes in the movie. This was done to indicate to the viewers that it was in no wise clear to see the surrounding. Most of the characters were in fact blind. As for myself I, I was watching it and I’m not blind so I could see but still not clearly. If I was to give credit to the person who did the film, except for the part where certain situations in the movies didn’t occur word for word as we’d have seen it in the book, the individual did a good job. If it’s even to demonstrate the blindness to its viewers.

Blindless Movie

The movie did a great job representing the book, the director did an amazing job of showing visual scenes of events that happened in the book. Watch this film it really showed a perspective of how difficult and crazy the situation is, one example of an event from the book that was put into the movies was when the boy urinated himself. The movie always had my attention and I personally think it was a great film.

Blindness

The film was very faithful to the original. I enjoyed the choice to make the cast as diverse as possible. I didn't imagine the characters to be any specific race but it was nice to see them portrayed in a way I didn't see before. The city they were in didn't look like any city I know. The police cars only said police and when the girl with the dark glasses goes to pay at the pharmacy, we can't see the money she's using. Those were nice touches. We discussed it in class already but the choice to make the cast very diverse added to this. No one person shared an accent. If a character had an accent, it was different from the other characters. Now that may seem like dumb, of course if lots of people are getting into one place, the chances of there being a huge variety of people from different backgrounds are high. However certain regions have a certain accent. Like the south for instance has the southern accent we mock. New Yorkers pronounce New York like "New Yuark". No one character shared an accent so it kept me constantly guessing as to where this city was.

Blindness

Compared to the novel the movie was moving at a more faster pace. For example, in the novel we met the old women with the chickens, hens and rabbits, but in the movie they never introduced us to her. Overall I really enjoyed it because they tried to put us the viewers in the characters shoes. They wanted us to see what it was really like to live in a world of the blinds. The sacrifices they had to make to escape that hellhole that they were kept as prisoners.

Interesting Aspect of Film, Blindness

Something that really peaked my interest throughout the film, was the way people slowly became. Since everyone went blind, their instincts turned them into animals or inhumane. For example, the men wanted to exchange women for food. They saw women as currency and took advantage of them. They saw it as a way to get what they want but they were stripping the women of their dignity. Another example, would be when the doctor's wife was in the supermarket. This made the people act as zombies, because they heard and smelled her with food and decided to hunt her down and take away everything. Overall, the disease made people act a whole different way than they actually were and made them become different people.

Blindness class talk

The film is really cool in my opinion. It was almost straight out of the book with only subtle differences, but nothing major. I liked the acting and the cinematography effects the film put in. Even the actors acting as blind people, movements, the blank stare, it was all close to how blind people act in real life. To an extent I think the movie serves as a metaphor and a type of lesson- we see the kinds of people in this environment, the blind who band together and form a family, and the blind people who believe its everevery man for themselves. We see that the main group grow a bond and are happier and survive longer than the others. They stick together and accomplish tasks. Humans are like this in todays society, considering the lack of compassion shown to each other in daily life. Even recently, Trump had a rally where he spoke about immigration and someone joked about shooting the immigrants, where he laughed along with the rest if the crowd. Humanity itself is blind to the fact that there are many injustices going on in our world, we just dont speak upon it.

Blindness

Throughout the movie I noticed something that never really came up in the novel. It was the fact that the movie maker's decided to add in all this white into the movie. I'm not talking about the white blindness that they are trying to show us in the movie as a constant reminder of what we are watching. I'm talking about the film edits, and the filters that make everything look more white. It also didn't show up in the movie filtering, but it was also shown throughout the movie with mupltile different entities. For example, the van that brought the 7 new blind people into the facility was white. The coffee mug in the end of the show was also white. So it was interesting to me that the movie makers decided to add in all this white.

Blindness Movie

Something that I noticed about the movie was that it was filmed and performed in a way that really made the watcher relate to the characters. When the women had to give themselves to the men for food i didn't feel like i was just watching something bad. I felt disgusted and felt my stomach turn although it was all acting. I almost didn't want to look anymore. Another thing was that when the group got to the house and the women started showering i shared feelings of happiness with them as if i was also living in a world of blindness.

Ekphrastic Cinematography

You all might not have been aware that several of the images in the film were inspired by painter Lucian Freud's work such as the painting below:

Pages 305 to 308

Pages 305 to 308 

In this part of the novel the girl with the dark glass confesses that she  loves the blind man with the eye patch. She had an argument that following and the man with the eye patch could not believe that she really love loved him because he was bind and old. When the girl with the dark glasses said she said it because of the woman she was today I am

 thinking that she is trying to say that she has changed from the person she was when was not blind like after going through such a tragic event her attitude changed because she is one that cared like a mother for the little boy with the squint eye

Scene Review- Blindness

        In this scene in Blindness the old man and young woman go back and forth about life and death and blindness in general. What they could possibly hope for to make their situation better but one is more optimistic than the other and who loves who more. They announce their love and talk about the things they’ve done.

Blindness-pages, 305-307

I noticed that the old man was basically establishing that they were practically useless and I arrived at that conclusion because he uttered that that is all they were good for. They were basically just listening to someone reading as most of them were in no position to read as a result of their blindness.  The girl in the dark glasses however, hastened to shed light that it was imperative that he demonstrate gratefulness given the fact that there was someone among them with a pair of eyes that could see.

I noticed that this section of the book emphasized the phrase “love is blind” because they are literally blind but in a way have feelings for one another. The man is insecure that if they weren’t blind she would never liked him because of his appearance or old age. She says she’s changed today and the man isn’t counting on it he’s going to see where this relationship will go in the future. This was a moment of relief and good feelings after all they have went through. The author probably included this towards the end of the book to create some closure and give them some type of happiness. It is revealed to the man who helped him to wash his back which was the girl with the dark glasses.

Blindness

Something I’ve noticed in this section of the book was the girl with dark glasses didn’t want to give up hope of finding her parents.

Blindness

I’ve noticed from the section we read that they were speaking on their feelings and it’s based off of affection not looks because they both are blind so they can’t see what the real them look like to judge . I think that’s truly beautiful in that case because now a days boys see a pretty face and a big butt and  then look for personality when it should be the opposite in my opinion. When you don’t take someone only for there looks but for their heart you get a deeper connection! I’m

Blindness class reading may/7

The part of the story that we read had to do with 2 characters and how getting to know a person is so important. It talks about the man discussing with the women about how if she wasnt blind, she wouldnt be in love with him, based on his looks. How could she love him if she barely even knows him, and how can he live with her if the feelings shared between each other are as unsure as the question of will they get their sight back?

Blindness

In this segment of blindness, they are all coming together as one. After being blind for such a period of time , they have all come to the realization they won’t make it if they don’t stick together. “Life has decided they should live together” is the quote that shows it all. Life put these people together for a reason and they will continue to live with each other till the end.

Blindness

Just finished reading the book and i’m speechless. The ending was so heart warming, yet touching.

Blindness: Novel and Film

As we finish the novel and watch the film adaptation this week (dir. Fernando Meirelles, 2008), I would like you think about both the conclusion of the novel and also the film adaptation. Some specific questions I have:

• What role does the old woman who lives by herself and feeds on raw rabbit play in the novel? As the doctor's wife says, "I can assure you that not even where we were living before were things so repugnant" (251). How can her life we worse that the hell they have escaped from? 
• Why does the blind author write if there is no one to read his work?
• What role does the dog of tears play in the novel? 
• The doctor's wife says, "In a way, everything we eat has been stolen from the mouths of others and if we rob them of too much we are responsible for their death, one way or another we are all murderers" (314). Remember what I said about sci-fi: That it's always about our life here, now? What does this statement say about our world?
• Why have the eyes of all the images and sculptures in the church been covered with white bandages or swipes of paint?
• Why do you think that people start to regain their eyesight at the end of the novel?
• When Fernando Meirelles asked Jose Saramago if he could film his novel, Saramago said that he could as long as the setting wasn't any recognizable city. Why do you think he made that condition?
• Why are there so many ethnicities represented in the film? Why do you think the first blind man and his wife speak Japanese? 
• All adaptations are just some people's interpretation of a text. That's why Shakespeare still gets performed even though his plays are over five hundred years old. What do you think of Meirelles' interpretation of the novel? In what ways did he realize your idea of the book? What things would you have done different if it were your movie?

Writer's Showcase

On Friday in S-112 from 12-2, there will be the first-annual Writer's Showcase. Three published QCC professors will read from their work followed by a Q&A. If any of you wish to attend and write a 1-p response about the event, I will give you extra credit. More details below:

Image interpretation

The second image is a woman who seems to be the leader of a set of people like a hero who has fought through the worst and earned victory and in the novel blindness the author uses the doctor's wife as leader of the set and she is the one that fought through the worst in the facility and brought everyone out still trying to keep them safe and went in the streets in search of food. In the sixth image, is Jesus having his last supper sitting with his twelve disciples. And the fifth image depicts a cottage in a farm that looks peaceful and quiet, but it seems to have a lot of emotions about the atmosphere the sky was kind clouded with grey smoke covering the beautiful scene.

In class reading

At the time when the radio announcer had gone blind it tarnished the little bit of hope the man with a patch had. At that moment i think it somehow finally sunk in that this whole predicament that is actually happening. He lost his sight but was still hopeful because of the radio he knew what was happening around them. He was blind before but now without his radio his truly blind to the events happening around him.

Describing Pictures (In-Class)

First: The people in the photo obviously look like they’re suffering. And also leading each other to their own doom. The first man wearing white and grey looks like he’s about to fall into a ditch and the man behind him. I see how they relate this piece of art to the main story of the novel. So far from what we have seen so far in the book, its gotten to a point where the infected citizens would get shot even if they get too close. The blind man in the painting can correlate to the man with the eye patch. He's giving the other infected news from the radio and as news spreads the message can get changed around a little. 

Second: In this photo there’s a person standing on top of corpses holding a French flag. The other men behind the person look like they depend on her deeply. I can correlate the woman in the picture to the eye doctor’s wife in novel. As where in the novel she’s one of the only characters in that sanctuary that can actually see. She’s leading the other blind individuals in there but to where? That question seems unanswered at this time.

Research Parties!

For those who need help on research for your annotated bibliographies, you might want to take advantage of the Library's Research Parties.

These five, drop-in Research Parties are designed to help students with end-of-semester research assignments.

 

Librarians will be on hand to help with topics, citations, article searching etc. And free snacks will be served!

 

Dates and times are as follows, and all will be held in L302:

 

5pm-7pm on Wednesday 5/8/19

11am-1pm on Thursday 5/9/19

11am-1pm on Friday 5/10/19

11am-1pm on Monday 5/13/19

5pm-7pm on Tuesday 5/14/19

As you can see, only the Wed. session is before the due date of the Collection. However, I will take Collections up until class time of 5/14. So obviously the very last session won't be useful for this class, but maybe you've got research in other classes you're doing.

Open Mic Followup: Extra Credit!

Anyone who reads at the open mic next Wed (see 5/01 for details) and then writes a 1-p response about the experience will get extra credit. Responses are due in class by the last day (5/14). Let me know if you have questions.

Blind man with the eyepatch

I feel like the blind man with the eyepatch uses the radio to get more knowledge of what’s truly going on in society during the time of this disaster. The radio puts emphasis on how much of a distraction the outside world currently is, due to the absurdity of life how people in the asylum are forcing girls for sex just to get things like medicine and food, and guards using guns to get jewelry and other personal goods and items. The blind man with the eyepatch really gets to transfer the news over that he’s heard to other people, and he’s freely allowed to speak about everything he wants and his thoughts.

Open Mic Poetry

I wanted you all to know about the Open Mic Multicultural Poetry Event. It's next Wednesday during club hours and all can participate. I know a lot of you have written some great poetry this term and you might be interested in reading your work to your peers. Even if not, it's always a good event and worth it to listen (esp. if the weather is nice!). It takes place in the Quad in front of the Humanities Bldg. See below for more info and write one of the sponsors if you'd like to get on the reading list (though you can probably just show up and read if you'd prefer).

ABC story

Would anyone be able to tell me what it is called when you start each sentence with each letter in alphabetical order in a story. We read one in class I just cant remember what the style of writing is called.

An example could be like:

Apples are my favorite fruit. Bananas are not. Carrots are orange.

that was really bad but its sort of like that ^^

The blind man with the black eyepatch

I feel like the radio helped the blind man to get some knowledge of what was taking place in life via the radio and the news. Listening to what was happening in the outside world help them to to feel so oblivious as to what was taking place in society.

Radio

The radio was very valuable and the man with the black eyepatch didn’t want to give it up because it was the only way of knowing what was happening outside. It gave him hope that a cure could come about but when the person on the radio turned blind he realized that maybe there isn’t any hope and he began crying because no one was on the radio anymore when he waited tor so long.

Radio

In this section of the book I feel like slowly everyone will start to blind and sooner or later the blind will rule the world.

Describing the photo

1. It looks like everyone is following blindly behind someone but the first least dollars and everyone is still following to fall in the same hole without realizing.

2. All these men want to kill the women but everyone who has already tried has died because her power is strong i see someone who has a gun about to shoot her but i just know he’ll die before even pulling that trigger.

3. It’s clearly a corn field in the night like blue sky with birds 

4.  Maybe a dessert i don’t reallt know what that is but there’s a stone on the floor and the sky is dusty. 

5, old society in a little village the people are on horses and carriage flowing through the water it looks as if it’s only one house so there’s low civilization.

6. Jesus last super everyone is talking while he’s blessing the food 

1st image interpretation

I feel like these persons were in bondage. The blind leading the blind and is escaping it but it is still showing as though they are exhausted as they were under these circumstances for a long time.

For the 2nd image- it’s as if there was a war and some of the folks die a woman was the leader and very few came out a victor.

For the 3rd image- I’m not quite sure what to make of it. The lower area seems like grass which is mostly burnt and the upper layer seems1st image interpretation  like the sky which is mostly dark and grey.

The 4th image seems like an animal a rat perhaps all alone looking out with a wall behind him reflecting yellow as though it is pierced with sunshine and under his chin a type of wall also that seems brown, of which he rests him neck to peek out.

The 5th image seems to consist of 2 persons on a carriage led horses. They are in a pond and on the back left of them where there is dry land and there is a dog on the front left there is an old house  and 2 persons standing in front of the house along with bushes surrounding them and a pretty blue why over head. 

The 6th image would seem like a representation of Jesus and his twelve disciples eating tougher and it would seem as though they are asking him which of them will betray him.

The 7th image would seem like a angel who happens to be a male in its form 

Image Descriptions

  In the photo you can see a woman standing on piles of a bodies while men are climbing to reach her. She also seems to be somewhat naked and reaching or calling out to something. The whole scene looks like the aftermath of a war. The next image is a painting of a field that is illuminated by the night sky and there are birds or crows flying around. The next image seems bland. From what i can make i out it is a man sitting down at the base of a hill. The 5th image is a nice house in an open area with people in the little lake or pond in front doing something with some type of contraption. The 6th picture is the last supper with Jesus and friends arguing over what seems to be like the bill for the food they ate. The next image makes me think of a mermaid caught in the middle of a dispute on land and sea.

Class images-Nicko

The first photo shown depicted what looked like men shoving other people into a pit, but using long sticks to do so, it looks like they dont want to touch them or want to be contaminated. The second picture shown is titled "Liberty Leading the People"-french revolution. The 3rd image is from Vincent Vangogh- the image is a Wheatfield with 3 diverging roads with crows flying all around. The 4th image seems to be a hill with a rock or a person sitting at the bottom. It's hard to make out. The 5th image is a nice house surounded by open land a small pond separating the two. A man appears to be trudging thru the pond with a wagon. The 6th image is Jesus sitting at the last supper, supplying his homies with good eats and drinks. My man Judas got no bev so hes tight. The 7th image is the birth of Venus, I believe. A goddess, shown to be appreciated by both heavin and the earth.

Image interpretations

In the first image, I see four blind men on the left holding a stick while following someone who is leading them but I’m guessing he’s not blind. I see someone on the ground but I’m not sure if he’s dead. In the second image I see a lady holding a flag up which seems like she’s claiming victory after what looks like she’s been struggling for because the top half of her dress is ripped. A man is staring at her chest which looks like he’s hypnotized by it. There’s a couple of head guys one without pants which I think would be the “bad guys”. The third image looks confusing but I see a sky and two moons and several birds flying towards it. I see green and red lines which could mean that it’s a path leading to somewhere. The fourth image looks confusing as well but I see the head of a dog and the brown part could be the ground and the dog is looking up. It definitely gives me sad vibes. I see a shadowy figure maybe that could be the owner of the dog and the dog sees him and misses him. In the fifth image I see lots of greenery and what looks like a lake and a dog. There is a wagon thing with two people on it and horses pushing it. In the sixth image I see a man in the middle which shows he’s important and people on the right and left eating and enjoying themselves. Looks like a happy gathering. In the seventh image I see a naked lady and someone getting a big scarf to wrap her in it. And I see a man and it looks like he’s spitting water at her maybe bathing her. He has wings and is holding another lady. There’s flowers around her which symbolize purity.

paintings + blindness

I think that the painting with the woman leading the people is closely related to the book because it shows the woman guiding the people behind her. In blindness, the doctors wife can be closely compared to this woman because she is also leading the blind people in the ward.

The painting of the naked woman with the people surrounding her relates to blindness because in the painting it almost looks like that they're worshiping this woman. The blind people in the book, in a way, worship the doctors wife because although they may not know that she can see, she seems to be the one getting them from point A to B

Dog

I don't remember animals being mentioned much in the novel but this dog could represent the blind internees. The dog is submerged and barely staying afloat. Just like the blind internees who struggle for survival but manage to get by. The dog could represent the doctor's wife as well. The doctor's wife is keeping her head up like the dog amongst blind thieves, disease, unsanitary conditions.

Painting

This painting of the French woman leading men in battle mirrors the doctor's wife in the story. The doctor's wife manages to rally everyone in order to fight against the thieves and she takes charge, even going as far as to kill the leader of the thieves because she had to be the one to step up. The woman in this painting is strong and the men look on at her with astonishment and a bit of surprise. The doctor's wife is strong just like this woman.

Picture Analysis

I see four men with a stick, following as they lead and I see a dead person on the floor. I think this relates to blindness, as all the people go blind and everyone becomes corrupt. I think this image signalizes the downfall and demise of the plague that’s spread among everyone. In the second picture, I feel like it represents Triumph and victory above all below, since the lady is holding up a stick which has a flag on it. She appears to be the leader of the whole group. The third picture shows a blurry road in which what appears to be batts all following along the same path, all seeking the same goal which is refugee to make it out somehow. The fourth picture shows a loner sitting on the floor with nothing left around him as he just wanders around thinking to himself, this emphasizes the ending of something. The fifth picture shows a lake around a village in which people are inside a nice house enjoying themselves. The sixth picture shows a man in a table with a bunch of people, in which they appear to be having a group discussion about something. It appears to be a happy crowd formed together.

Ekphrasis

 Ekphrasis is when you write in response to art. Saramago uses real-world art in his novel in several places.

On p. 123, Saramago writes of "...the blind people in the painting, walking together, falling together and dying together." This is the painting that Saramago is referring to, by Bruegel from the 16th Century:

 

And on p. 233, after the doctor's wife and the others are free from the mental institution and she leads her band of survivors, the narrators says, "...this was not liberty leading the people, the bags fortunately full, are too heavy for her to carry them aloft like a flag." This is a reference to French 19th century painter Eugene Delacroix's Liberty Leading the People, commemorating the French Revolution of 1830:

On pp. 128-129, the "unknown voice" in the ward tells of the painting that he was looking at when he went blind. This painting is actually several very famous paintings. He describes "a picture of a cornfield w/ crows and cypress trees and a sun that gave the impression of having been made up of the fragments of other suns." This is probably a reference to Wheat Field with Crows by the Dutch painting Vincent Van Gogh:

Then he describes "...a drowning dog...already half-submerged, poor creature..." This is probably Spanish painter Francisco Goya's The Dog:

And then "there was a cart laden with hay, drawn by horses and crossing a stream," with "a house on the left." This is probably Hay Wain by British painting John Constable:

The "thirteen men" eating is probably Italian painter Leonardo Da Vinci's The Last Supper:

And finally, a naked woman with fair hair, inside a conch that was floating on the sea, and masses of flowers around her" is obviously Sandro Botticelli's The Birth of Venus:

The unknown voice describes all these paintings as being a part of the same painting. The paintings are painted by different painters, exist in different museums in different countries. What do you make about this experience in the context of the novel?

Post apocalyptic movie

This is one of my favorite post apocalyptic movies San Andreas (2015). What I also see in almost every post apocalyptic story is the characters fighting for survival.
That makes it interesting For example in this movie the characters had to fight for survival no matter what it takes likewise in  Blindness the doctors wife and the others were together fighting through that disease. She plays a major role of guiding the group of bind people to survive the disease  

https://youtu.be/PnpouwLCZnE

Blindness

I'm glad the doctor's wife finally took a stand against the thieves. I've been waiting for this to happen since she found the scissors. The fact it took her that long to do it was annoying. The situation was worsening by the day and people were starving. I get that a person doesn't shed their morals that easily but this was survival. She needed to do this sooner. I thought it was interesting that there's a contrast between the doctor and his wife. Obviously one can see and the other can but it runs deeper than that. Throughout the book, the doctor is seen as a voice of reason. People look to him for authority. His wife is in the background and no one really regards her with the same type of feelings they have for the doctor. People expect the doctor to rise up to the occasion but it's his wife that does it. She cares for her little group. She is the one who takes charge and kills the leader of the thieves and she does it with easily. She even remarks that she would kill again if it were necessary. It's nice to see how strong the wife is compared to the doctor.

Blindness

I don't remember whether or not we were supposed to do these posts during break but I'll do it anyways. One thing that I found surprising was how the thieves still asked for valuables even though they were blind and stuck in an asylum.What would they do with the goods? Society as they knew it was breaking down, by the time they got out these goods might not have even been worth anything. The one thing that bothered me was how the thieves had a gun. How did they sneak a gun in? I'm guessing the military saw that they had a gun and figured it would only help them since it could be used to take out some of the infected. Maybe I missed a part where they explained how the leader of the thieves got a gun. Maybe the military gave them a gun so they could start killing off the infected. It's kind of suspicious that the only ward with an actual blind man who knows how to live with being blind, managed to get possession of a gun.

Blindness

From reading the orders sent from the government pp 42-44 it almost sounds like the government have full control over the blind people and yet they are not interested in bringing in other professionals to look into the situation.They just have full control and don't have the best interest to offer help.It also sounds like these people are 
sentence to a punishment of some sort rather than treatment. Also what I have noticed so far from reading is that the author focuses on a group of people going bind like a micro study because we know what happens to just these people in the facility and not people in the outside world like is this disease spreading else where or not.He just focuses on few characters as of this point. Also he shows how each blind character react to this crisis.I am curious to read more in order to find out if there will be a cure and how will this end.

Blindness and bird box

This book is low key like bird box. The only difference is the people in the book was just getting blind randomly and just have to live with not seeing. In bird box the people was safe as long as they kept their blindfolds on. If they took it off they were on the urge of dying.

blindness and birdbox

I see some very close similarities between the book blindness and the movie Birdbox. In the movie birdbox for them to survive, they can't look at the outside world or obstruct their view just enough so they can barely see anything. But at the end of the movie, they found a refugee camp that was a school for the blind. They were the ones to mainly survive because of their disability. In the book, Blindness people are just randomly losing their eyesight, and no one knows why. But the Doctors wife seems to be the only one immune to what appears to be an airborne disease.

Blindness opinion

Wow just imagine that your just living your daily life on just a regular day,and all of a sudden for some weird and unexpectedly you go completely blind. I would imagine that if this happen in real life I would think the doctors and nurses would go blind too. Unless they would have a protected power that keeps them safe from getting blind too. But realistically your not going to get blind from catching it from someone. Its not a contagious disease but other wise I like the creativity in this book. Its different from anything I read. I'm not really into syfy type stuff but this book is interesting.

Blindless and Birdbox

both have major similarities when it comes to loss of sight or the inability to use their sight. They are also similar in the way of everyone having to adapt to their surroundings and now their circumstances. The major difference between the two is in Birdbox aliens have taken over and in Blindless people randomly start to lose their eyesight.

Blindness pg 66-69

In this part the facility is getting more crowded the characters are getting worried about the food supplies and how unhygienic their surrounding is getting. It also shows how the eye specialist is just thrown away in this facility and not being looked after although he is an educated professional. These people are locked up and did not get the help promised by the government. It's as if they were already dead to society.

Post-Apocalyptic Story

I don’t know any post-apocalyptic stories but I guess in a sense the blind people in the ward are being treated similarly to as zombies. They’re being isolated, threatened, and are considered hazardous. Also it’s every man for themselves as people have to survive on their own. People in zombie movies probably want to trap the zombies, and the people in the ward are basically trapped.

Blindness vs. Bird Box

The differences that blindness and bird box have is that something in the air is making people go crazy and kill themselves once they look at it, so they have to cover there eyes making them not able to see while certain people are just getting blind with no explanation. Also the government wasn’t able to catch it on a certain amount of people, everyone was getting affected if they looked at what was outside. Everyone was free and not controlled by the government. Another difference is that in blindness, nobody knows why they are getting blind. In Bird Box, we know that there’s something in the air that makes you go crazy once you look at it. In these two cases, people were choosing to be blind while others were just going blind.

Bird box as opposed to blindness

as for birdbox the characters had to keep their eyes covered so as to avoid them from Leung affected by something that is in the atmosphere that would affect them. If they were to see it they would eventually die. If they were to look in the eyes of those who have seen the particular thing that was contributing to them affecting their lives, they would kill themselves. They would die. For blindness it is contagious one person had it and the next person they come in contact with eventually catches it. These people wind up seeing this whiteness and eventually they are forced to be in a space with everyone else who has it. The difference between both is that with blindness the persons only dire if they are shot but not because they are forced to kill themselves without even knowing why. If they were to do this in blindness then it would be a choice but not something that they do not have control over.

Blindness and Birdbox

      Blindness is like birdbox post-apocalyptic wise because both have a main premice of an illness or infection of the eye that causes issues. The difference is that in birdbox when people open their eyes outside or look outside they become overwhelmed with an urge to kill themselves unlike blindness where they just go blind in general and live with the confines of not seeing.

Bird Box

The difference would be that the blind in Birdbox are at an advantage and are voluntarily covering their eyes to avoid the creatures that induce suicide. The similarity would be that they are both in a time of something that is spreading across the world. The people in birdbox that want you to look at the creatures would be a difference and also there isn’t government regulations, everyone is free to do their own thing. In Blndess there is govt regulation and isolation from the general population but it’s still spreading. Another similarity is that there are groups which do their own regulations and planning.

Blindness-Birdbox

The story Blindness and the movie Birdbox share similarities straight from the jump that is almost impossible to miss. Both are set in post apocalyptic settings that have a lone woman being a protagonist almost- but definitely different from all the other individuals. In Blindness, the woman (doctors wife) is not blind, and that makes her special due to the fact shes able to do what the others are not able to. In Birdbox, the main character is different due to her strong will and love for the children she's responsible of. While the 2 are similar, there are also differences. In the book, being blind is bad. Its almost like an infection that spreads and nobody wants to be blind. In the movie, in order to survive you must be blind or risk death.

blindness/dawn of the dead

 In the beginning of Dawn of the Dead, society is starting to break down. The people are trying to save their zombie relatives and hide them away while the government tries to contain the plague by any means necessary. While it seems like society is holding strong against the plague, eventually government contact ends leaving the protagonists on their own. Blindness is similar because the government in this story shares the same sentiment as the government in Dawn of the Dead. Both governments want to contain the plague as much as they can. In Dawn of the Dead and Blindness, they don't know how the plague started. The doctor's wife going along with her husband is similar to the way families kept their undead relatives in basements because they wanted to help them. Even the zombies kept in the basements mirror the blind because the zombies were kept isolated and their only interaction with people was when they were fed. The infected in Blindness only interacted with the soldiers when they wanted food or a spade to bury their dead.

Blindness / Birdbox

A way that this movie is similar to Blindness is that both symbolizes Hope. In Birdbox the characters made a choice to cover their eyes and Blindness they didn’t have a choice they just went blind.

birdbox-blindness

Birdbox and Blindess are very similar but also very different. In both, the characters cant see and sort of have to live like every man for themselves. The difference though, it that in Birdbox, they are covering their eyes so that they dont look at whatever it is that makes people kill themselves. In Blindness, people just went blind for no reason.

A quiet place

A quiet place is related to blindness because in the movie everyone has to be quiet if they were to speak this big monsters would come to hunt and kill them and they all work together to survive. Relating to blindness they don’t have to be quiet but they have to be cautious of what they say and how the move for example they can’t move how they want if they were to try and leave they will die. A little difference i see yes they will all work together to survive they all have no choice it’s there life now but a counter claim would be everyone turning against each other because of the simple fact there trapped.

Blindness- chapter summary

As the story goes on, we learn that the soilders are just as scared as the civilians, even going as far as to shoot anyone that comes close. The guy that got stabbed in his knee was the first one killed (the car thief) when he crawls out to the guards and ask for medication for his wound. In a panic he is shot in the head.

Blindness

In this part of the story, new arrivals are coming. It’s getting more crowded and people are getting irritated. The new arrivals are excepting doctors, and a possible cure but are upset to see that there’s nothing being done at the facility. How is the place going to survive with so many people involved, lack of food, lack of hygiene products, etc is the concern. The place is going on to how animals are treated.

Nickolai, Theodor , Nicole H. Group #3

Ways society has broken down
-everyone because independent
-everyone was worried about their own issues rather than focusing on getting through it together

Ways it will break down even more
-they will kill eachother
-more people will get infected

Purpose of the doctors wife
-she is almost like their savior

Similar to
-birdbox
-a quiet place

How is it different?
-there isn't a specific reason why everyone is going blind

Blindness pg 66-69

3 more blind persons arrived and settled in. For the most people were just settling in and some were discomforted and expressed that through crying. Some voiced how they were going to die being locked up where they were. The reason for this was because they were promised some form of assistance. Thoughts were voiced inwardly  as to how they would cope under the given circumstances. They were blind except for the doctor’s wife and if the doctor was to be shaved by his wife then suspicion would be raised that she could actually see.

Blindness

      In this scene of the story the doctor and his wife arrive at the quarantine area and while entering the car thief who also went blind is with them. As they are escorted in he gropes the prostitute and she kicks him in the leg with her heels badly injuring him. The doctor and his wife patch him up best they can. The doctors wife later wonders why she still hasn’t gone blind. She wakes up before everyone else and seems to analyzing the current conditions of the hospital their in slowly realizing what things would be like by the way the guards act towards them and overall how they are assessing the situation.

Blindness

Everyone is getting blind and the ward is trying to shove everybody into one room and it seems to me it’s getting over stuffed and sooner or later the protest will turn into rioting because that’s not a good feeling of living. Bad enough they’re  locked away from the rest of the world but now since majority is getting blind also, they have to share a tiny room with them.how is the wife not blind yet

blindness

i think this section of the book is trying to show the reader how these people with this mysterious blindness are being treated. Almost like animals with rabies. Nobody wanted to go near them or help them because they fear the blindness aswell

Blindness

This segment in the novel serves to show how much worse the epidemic is getting inside the mental asylum and outside. The fact that there were so many blind people flooding into the wards shows how much more the plague has spread. The government must not be doing that great of a job keeping the blindness contained. This segment also shows the tense and hostile environment that is starting to form in the asylum. A group of people can be easily managed and usually are charitable to one another. With the sudden increase in blind people, now there will be conflict. People will fight over food and turn the place into a sewer. The chaotic situation on the inside almost mirrors the one on the outside. Both the outside world and the asylum are barely keeping themselves together and the government is struggling to keep order in both of these places.

Blindness

People are freaking out and having a hard time because they can’t see and are upset because they were promised help, but there was only the blind doctor. He doesn’t have the equipment necessary and he can’t see so his options are very limited. Also, because they can’t see they are just staying in their ward because they’re worried they will get lost. It also mentioned that because they are blind, they can’t shower, shave, or use the bathrooms by themselves and that there was no one to help them.

blindness

I think that this part of the book is giving the reader a look at how blind people are being badly treated. I think that the blind are being treated like this because no one knows what's happening and it if it might be contagious. But it's still no excuse to treat these people like animals.

Blindness

I think this part of the novel supports that this blindness is contagious because the people that had close contact with the girl with the dark glasses. The eye doctor is feeling helpless even though his wife could help him out but he’s fearful of suspicion. I’m still wondering how his wife can still see when she’s been around them for so long? They are going to be in isolation for a long time it seems and order will be lost. The doctor can already tell the asylum isn’t going to have enough space.

Blindness

Something I’ve noticed yesterday and today while reading this scene was that the internees are being treated like prisoners. They don’t get their good on time and the soldiers don’t care about them nor their health.

Blindness

It’s really annoying that the author writes in so long paragraphs. However it seems like the blind people are being treated like prisoners and have to ask for food when the soldiers were supposed to have all that ready. They shot and killed nine internees without hesitation. I hope that the soldiers get infected as well because they deserve it.

Blindness and the Apocalypse

As you read Blindness, I'd like you to make connections to other post-apocalyptic films, TV shows, novels, comic books, myths, video games etc. What is your favorite posts-apocalyptic story? Or, if you've never seen one or never seen one you liked, why not? Why do you thinks these stories have been with us for thousands of years? What do they speak to? (Feel free to use the link/image/video buttons above to link to internet images and/or video.)

Here's a clip from one of my favorite post-apocalyptic films, George Romero's Dawn of the Dead (1978):

As you continue to read the novel, what do you imagine will happen? What have you been surprised by? What questions do you have?

Blindness

From reading so far the car thief was the second person that goes bind and had contact with the first bind man at first I thought that it was karma that caused them to go bind( the thief and girl with the dark glasses) then I realized after the class discussion that the little boy also goes bind and then I probably got a little confused but I am curious as to why the author choose these characters to go bind and it’s probably not karma. I am interested in what’s going to happen next in the facility and how the blindness is going to spread and how would the doctor’s wife acting blind pays out. 

End of the World

I predict that the end of the world will be horrifying. I feel like it will be just like the Hollywood movies, not ending in a snap of your fingers, but taking days. I feel as if people will suffer and it will be a very sad event happening. I don't see the world ending peacefully mainly because the way movies portray it. The way the movies go about it, makes it seem like all of those events can truly come true.

End of the World

    My idea of the end of the world would be earth slowly over time losing more and more of its natural resources. Just the generic sources we use even for self sustenance will grow scarce. Food, water, and even shelters will be relied on even more until they eventually start to decay because the earth will not be able to sustain itself. Eventually it will fall apart more and more until theres nothing left or anything to allow for our survival.

End of the world Story-Nicko

Waking up from cryostasis, I was shocked for two reasons- how did i end up here qnd where is everyone? I awoke, liquid filling up my pod from the thawing ice all around me and the sound of an alarm screaming louder than anything ive ever heard before. I push open the latch to see other pods, empty as well, and no trace of anybody being here in years. As I use all my strength to crawl out the pod, I find it incredibly hard to stand, but I know I have to escape. I know I need to find a way out and see of anyone is out there. I drag my body across this huge office until I someone have the strength to stumble to a locker without a padlock to search what's inside. To my pleasure, I find an old janitor jumpsuit, dusty and filled with spiderwebs but anything I can use to cover me would be beneficial. I need to find a way out. Stumbling up the stairs I get eventually find myself at a huge safe vault door, looking as if i was in a movie and opening this door would provide me all the money in a bank, I attempt to open the door. The door is heavy, definitely sealed tight to keep people from not coming inside... or to keep what's inside from coming out. After hours of turning and pushing, the constant turning allowed the door to finally open. I take a step outside and am blinded by the sun for a few minutes. When I open my eyes i could barely breathe... but what's more than that is that I can barely believe what i can see... nothing. I see nothing. Miles and miles of sand and dust mixed together as if I was placed into a desert. I begin walking towards one direction in hope of finding something. I'll have to find something eventually... right?

End of the world

I think the people that will witness the end of the world will be horrified. It will be the worst thing that has happened in their life time. Everyone will feel helpless and some won’t even know who to call out for help. I don’t think there will be any survivors and the world itself will not  be there anymore hence “end of the world” The idea of the world ending is filled with many theories but no one has the ultimate answer or knowledge of how it will be carried out and when it will happen. It isn’t exciting for me but it’s my worst fear to witness such a scene. People might question seconds before dying: “so what’s next? What will become of me after this? What will happen to my conscious?” How does not existing feel like? We can’t even ask a dead person. Sad.

End of the world

I think when the world ends it’s going to be a least one person that survives. I used to think that everyone would die and and everything would be gone or destroyed. Now I kinda think there going to be at least one person that will make it and evolution will start over.

End of the world

When it’s time for the world to end I feel like we won’t even know until it’s too late just because of the simple fact we always wait till last mintute to do something. Just like death, when people die others say “ I should’ve told you I loved you, I should’ve did more for you, etc.” when we have the time to do it we never think twice to. Not like karma but that’s the way life works, the end of the world is basically death but why wait to know when the end is the world is just so you can be great. That’s why I feel we will never even know when it will end so that we can do everything till our full extent with no deadlines. Maybe it won’t even end, maybe it’ll just be another afterlife.

The end of the world

If the world were to end, I think it should end in the absolute worst way possible. Humanity has thrived for centuries so it might as well go out with a bang. The apocalypse should come in the form of a Romero style zombie apocalypse. Slow and semi intelligent zombies who are deadly in numbers. In Romero's living dead trilogy(Night of the living dead, Dawn of the dead and day of the dead), zombies outnumber humans 500000 to 1 if I remember correctly. For comparison, in The Walking Dead, I think the number of zombies to humans is only 5000 to 1. The ideal end of the world scenario is a situation where the odds are so severely stacked against humanity to the point where humanity is wiped out. What better way to do that than with a George A. Romero style apocalypse where guns never run out of ammunition and humans spend more time fighting each other than the dead.

End Of The World

When it comes to something so depressing, though you know it’s going to happen eventually, you will never really know what’s going to bring about this action. Our own people are messing up our planet so therefore we might kill off our own species.

End of the world

When I hear “the end of the world”, I picture the earth disappearing along with everyone and everything in it. I believe in an afterlife and that people will go there when they die.

End Of The World

When it’s time for the world to end, I feel like us humans depend so much on timing and getting things done after time, that we will have absolutely no time to react. I feel like it will happen so unexpectedly that the whole world will become corrupt and absolute chaos and leave us with little to no time to react at all. In stories, I feel like the end of the word is often over dramatized just how they say, “As they lived happily ever after”, but in real life my claim is that that is not the case at all. I feel like the world is gonna end due to a Nuclear war, an asteroid, or a black hole. Also, another possibility is our earth consuming tons of electricity, turning our earth into a fire ball, completely dusting and wasting everything that ever lived, such as us humans, nature, wild life, buildings, property, and the world’s entirety.

Blindness

The car thief has several mixed emotions currently running through his head as he’s driving. He acknowledges helping the blind man get to his house safely, but starts to feel guilt and remorse for what he’s truly done, by stealing his car. The car thief is the second person to go blind in the book so far, and this emphasizes the spread of blindness, and the effect it’s having on the people starting to cause chaos. While he’s driving, he debates whether or not he should speed up and drive fast, disobeying the traffic laws, due to him having worries of the police capturing him and arresting him. This worry and fear that the robber deals with while driving and thinking about what harm he’s truly done, builds tension and nervousness and helps us as the reader to get in his shoes and see things from his perspective.

Blindness

After stealing the 1st blind man car, he started feeling guilty and mixed feelings about stealing the car. Then while driving, he got blind. In some sort of way, as a punishment for stealing the car was the become blind as well. Going on forward with the story, he’s the second person who got blind so it could mean that this blindness is going to spread making it a problem in this community.

Blindness

The car thief has several mixed emotions currently running through his head as he’s driving. He acknowledges helping the blind man get to his house safely, but starts to feel guilt and remorse for what he’s truly done, by stealing his car. The car thief is the second person to go blind in the book so far, and this emphasizes the spread of blindness, and the effect it’s having on the people starting to cause chaos. While he’s driving, he debates whether or not he should speed up and drive fast, disobeying the traffic laws, due to him having worries of the police capturing him and arresting him. This worry and fear that the robber deals with while driving and thinking about what harm he’s truly done, builds tension and nervousness and helps us as the reader to get in his shoes and see things from his perspective.

Response to blindness

I personally feel like this man is reaping what he had sown. It would generally be considered something that he deserved simply because of the fact that he stole the car. It’s as if he didn’t demonstrate an act of kindness for merely being kind because he had an ulterior motive that was not necessarily exhibited. His deceptive skills were quite alive I’d say...

Blindness

        In this scene from Blindness we see that the man offering to take the first blind man home after losing vision becomes very nervous after planning on stealing the car. He’s often adhering to street signs, traffic, and lights even more than he would usually do to avoid being pulled over or getting into any accidents. His nervousness builds a mood and allows the reader to imagine what he’s feeling through scene. Claiming that it only takes one wrong move for the police to pull them over and it would be right back to prison.

Blindness

The car thief is going through lots of emotions in this part. He's afraid of being caught by police. Something that is interesting is the part of the chapter where the concept of karma. The thief is worried about the consequences he'll face whether it be from police or facing the same fate as the blind man. This segment in the book establishes that the blindness is contagious.

Blindness

I believe in this section of the book the author is showing us how taking advantage of someone’s weakness can eventually come back around and get you. Aka "Karma."

Blindness

A second person has now gone blind and in a sense it is foreshadowing that many more people are going to start to lose their vision. I think it is also foreshadowing that people are going to take advantage of other people being blind and try to take things from them.

Blindness

Starting from page sixteen I think what happened to the thief was karma. In my opinion he got what he deserved. He shouldn’t have stole the car, he should have carried out his good intentions all the way to the end. What use of helping the man when he took the opportunity of stealing his car when the first blind man was in a vulnerable state.  I think maybe this book will aim on the good and the bad but maybe emphasize how even when a bad person turns blind he is still the same person nothing changes about him. He will blame others.

Blindness

When i first read that the theif went blind I thought it was good karma because how dare you! That was the guilt of his wrongdoing putting shame on him. I feel like i could picture his panicking from the text. When I  his scene of him going blind it seemed to me that since he came in contact with the old blind guy he helped home, he gained blindness but the other part of me was saying like blindness cannot be contagious so i was confused but then i read on in the chapter...

blindness

I think that what is happening in these few pages is that anyone who had contact with the first blind man will eventually go blind as well. I also looked it in a way of like 'what goes around comes around' because right after he steals the car he goes blind.

Blindness- class read

In class, we just read pages 16-19 and have learned about the inner monologue one of the character has to himself. We learn that he has just been to jail and is afraid to go back, after just stealing a car from a blind man that he's recently helped- he is pressured and is filled with a strange worying feeling. He parks the car and decides to clear his head and later finds himself going blind, just like the man he helped.

Starting Blindness

The first people stricken with the "white plague," the plague of blindness end up in an abandoned mental institution. As the internees go in single-file to the bathrooms, the car thief feels up the young woman in the dark glasses and she kicks him, injuring him w/ her high heels (this will not go well for him). He has already stolen the first blind man's car. He's clearly not what we would call a good man, but he is not even close to the worst man that we will see in this novel. The truth is that this "disease" or whatever it is seems to bring out the best in some people, but it also brings out the worst in others. I wonder if we can reach any conclusions about this fact? Don't we like to think that people pull together in time's of struggle? Think about the volunteers at 9/11 and first responders who sacrificed their lives. Now think about people who scam victims' families or set up fake fund-raisers. All sci-fi and post-apocalyptic stories tell us something about the world we live in now. What does this novel tell us about our current society?

Other questions:

• Why do none of the characters have names? Why does this city not have a name?
• Why do all the blind people see the color white?
• How did you react to the official announcement of the govt. at the mental institution (pp. 42-44)?
• What do you think will happen next?
• What questions do you have? 

Blindness

Gotta Say from the beginning nothing was really making sense until like 7-10 pages in then everything started to fall into place. It’s crazy how this disease can be passed on.

Blindness

I've taken some time to start reading the new book that we are supposed to read for the next class. The name of the book is Blindness by Jose Saramago, before getting into it we were told that it would be the same kind of outlook as the Netflix movie BirdBox. The book starts off with a man randomly going blind during rush hour. Another man helps the blinded man and drives him home and then starts to steal to blind's man car. Then the man who stole the car also went blind as well. Then afterward tons of people started to go blind as well. From what I've read so far it was hard to distinguish the meaning of it yet.

Blue Angel (Final Chapters)

This novel can definitely be related to the movie we watched in class. Some of the scenes in the book represents Rath's downfall and also Professor Swenson's downfall. The moment when Professor Swenson's rents the movie Blue Angel from Video Village and watches the film and relates it to his current situation with Angela. The author's use of irony is key in this scene is funny because he looks down on Professor Rath for his mistakes and states how the mistakes he made are different than the ones from Rath. In the end, both teachers regretted their harmful decisions and learned their mistakes.

Blindness

This book was sort of challengijg the first ten pages because I'm not use to the author writing the dialogue in such a way that it isn't directly noticable that there is dialogue. I was sort of confused on why the wife went to the asylum with her husband, and no one picked up on that. She did a bunch of things that to a blind person might seem like something you would need you eyes for, for example the bandaging of the leg of the thief. I also found it interesting that there are no names being mentioned. It's sort of vague who the characters names are, and overall there is no mention of the town, the country, nothing. But perhaps because the people are blind tye author kinda wants us to be blind in reading this book to certain aspects of the book... Just something to think about.

Blue angel

After finishing the last of the book I was kinda sad that it didn't tell us what will wind up happening to the Prof. I also found it weird that he saw a doe. Im not sure if that was supposed to symbolize something specific, but just curious as to why a doe in particular... But overall I found the book quite interesting to read...

Blindness

The premise of the book is interesting. I remember seeing a part of the movie when I was a kid but I didn't really understand what was going on. Now I'm reading the actual book and the one thing that threw me off was the dialogue and characters. The dialogue doesn't have any quotation marks and it's not separated from the rest of the text. It's like a stream of consciousness and it was hard at first to understand which character was saying what. I grew to appreciate it though because the cluttered and chaotic writing style sort of mirrors what's going on in the book. People are confused. There's a plague of blindness going around and it's causing chaos and discord among the population. The writing style reflects that. It's jumbled and all over the place.The decision not to give the characters any names though seems weird to me. On the blurb in the back it says Blindness is a "powerful portrayal of man's worst appetites". It's kind of hard to see that when I can't really sympathize with these characters.I understand that the book does show the worst of humanity but for now the character interactions to me don't seem very genuine. Giving a character something as simple as a name can humanize them. We can visualize them and maybe even relate with them. It's hard to relate to characters who are only referred to as the doctor or the thief. Maybe the book will prove me wrong though. I'm sure it gets better as it goes along and it'll get to a point where I won't even care about characters not having any names.

Blindness

I really like how the beginning of the book starts with the conflict right away and that catches my attention. I already have a feeling why the car isn’t moving judging from the name of the book and it turns out he is the first guy who turns blind. It’s interesting how he only sees white rather than black like you would think a blind person only sees black. I think the book having long sentences and no names of people shows it’s uniqueness and how different it’s style is from the other books I’ve read. I start feeling sympathy for the man right away because he just got blind out of no where and is separated yet still in the world of colors.

Blue angel-final aspect

I don’t like the way the book ended. It left the reader (me) in the position where you’re not quite sure what is going to happen for Angela and nothing was mentioned about Sherrie. We’re not sure if Swenson and her will eventually reconcile or whether her their daughter will come to that place where she will consider it as water under the bridge. I think things look awfully dim for Swenson but there is hope for him to find himself in some way or another again. I noticed how much Angela lied so much in the courtroom and how Swenson hardly got to speak his mind on his side of of the story. He just wasn’t fighting anymore. He was just letting things be other than in his thoughts. A fictional book it was but it’s not something that is impossible to be a real life story, maybe not exactly the same as the book, word for word but situations with teacher student has occurred that I’ve heard of before and it always ends up where the teacher loses his job.