How Does 'Blindness' Critique Society?

I've always been chilled by how 'Blindness' strips society down to its brutal core. The novel isn't just about physical blindness—it's about the collapse of civilization when people lose their moral compass. The government's instant quarantine of the infected shows how quickly fear erodes human rights. What makes it dystopian is the rapid descent into chaos: hospitals become prisons, corpses rot in streets, and the strong prey on the weak. The lack of names for characters drives home how identity crumbles in crisis. It mirrors real-world pandemics and refugee camps, but pushes the horror further by removing even basic visual connection between people. The scenes where women are forced to trade sex for food reveal how easily dignity evaporates when systems fail.

The plot of 'Blindness' was deeply inspired by the author’s fascination with human vulnerability and societal collapse. I’ve always been drawn to stories that explore how people react when stripped of their comforts and norms. The idea of a sudden epidemic of blindness felt like the perfect metaphor for how fragile our systems are. It’s not just about physical blindness but the moral and ethical blindness that follows. The novel mirrors how quickly society can unravel when fear takes over, and how individuals either rise or fall in the face of chaos. I think the author wanted to challenge readers to confront their own assumptions about humanity and survival. The setting, deliberately unnamed, adds to the universality of the story, making it feel like it could happen anywhere, to anyone. It’s a stark reminder of how interconnected we are and how easily those connections can break.

In 'A Patch of Blue', Selina's blindness isn't just a physical condition—it sculpts her entire worldview. Unlike sighted characters who judge by appearances, she perceives people through voice, touch, and intuition. Her isolation in a toxic household sharpens her other senses; she detects kindness in Gordon’s hesitant footsteps and malice in her mother’s grip long before either is spoken aloud. The darkness becomes her shield against visual prejudices, letting her love Gordon purely for his soul. Yet blindness also traps her. She depends on others for truths about the world, leaving her vulnerable to lies—like her mother’s racism, which she unknowingly echoes until Gordon’s patience untangles it. Her lack of sight makes her hunger for experiences tactile and vivid: rain feels like 'a thousand tiny kisses,' and her joy at touching trees or feeding pigeons is achingly poignant. The film’s brilliance lies in showing how blindness both limits and liberates—her vulnerability becomes her strength, her innocence a catalyst for change in those around her.

I've read 'Blindness' multiple times and researched its background extensively. José Saramago's masterpiece isn't based on a specific true story, but it's deeply rooted in real human behavior during crises. The novel mirrors historical events where societies collapsed due to pandemics, like the Black Death or cholera outbreaks. Saramago took inspiration from how people react when systems fail—the selfishness, the brutality, but also the unexpected kindness. The white blindness epidemic serves as a metaphor for how humanity stumbles through moral darkness. What makes it feel so real is the raw portrayal of human nature stripped bare, not unlike actual accounts from war zones or disaster areas. For those interested in similar themes, 'The Plague' by Albert Camus explores parallel ideas about societal breakdown.

The ending of 'Blindness' hits like a punch to the gut. After surviving the chaos of the epidemic where society collapses due to mass blindness, the doctor's wife—the only one who kept her sight—watches as vision suddenly returns to everyone. It’s not a clean victory though. The city is in ruins, people are traumatized, and there’s no explanation for why the blindness disappeared as mysteriously as it came. The final scene shows people rebuilding, but the story leaves you wondering if humanity learned anything. The doctor’s wife whispers, 'I don’t think we went blind, I think we were always blind,' suggesting the real blindness was moral, not physical. The abrupt return of sight feels almost cruel, like the universe played a joke on humans by revealing their fragility.

In 'Blindness', the societal collapse is depicted through the rapid breakdown of order when an epidemic of blindness strikes. The novel shows how quickly civilization crumbles when people lose their sight, and with it, their ability to function as a society. The government’s response—quarantining the blind in an abandoned asylum—only accelerates the chaos. Inside, the inmates are left to fend for themselves, and the lack of oversight leads to a descent into savagery. The novel explores how fragile societal structures are, and how easily they can be dismantled when fear and desperation take hold. It’s a chilling reminder of how dependent we are on systems that can collapse overnight. The story also delves into the psychological impact of blindness, showing how it strips away the veneer of civility. People revert to primal instincts, hoarding food, forming factions, and resorting to violence. The novel doesn’t just focus on the physical blindness but also the metaphorical blindness of humanity—our inability to see the consequences of our actions, our selfishness, and our capacity for cruelty. Yet, amidst the darkness, there are glimmers of hope, as some characters retain their humanity and compassion, suggesting that even in the worst circumstances, there’s a possibility for redemption.

In 'Blindness', the novel by José Saramago, the narrative dives deep into the psychological and societal breakdown caused by the sudden epidemic of blindness. The prose is dense, poetic, and introspective, forcing readers to confront the fragility of human civilization and morality. The movie adaptation, while visually striking, simplifies some of these themes. It focuses more on the physical horror and survival aspects, losing the novel’s philosophical weight. The characters in the book are unnamed, emphasizing their universality, but the film gives them identities, which shifts the focus to individual stories rather than collective human experience. The novel’s ambiguous ending, leaving readers to ponder the cyclical nature of humanity’s flaws, is replaced in the film with a more concrete resolution. Both are compelling, but the book’s layers of meaning are harder to translate to the screen. The movie does excel in its use of visual metaphors, like the stark white blindness and the chaotic, decaying environments. However, it lacks the novel’s ability to linger on the internal struggles of the characters. For instance, the book’s exploration of how the blind adapt to their new reality, finding ways to communicate and organize, is more nuanced than the film’s portrayal. The novel’s narrative style, with its long, flowing sentences and lack of punctuation, creates a sense of disorientation that mirrors the characters’ experience. The film, by contrast, uses conventional storytelling techniques, making it more accessible but less immersive. Both versions are worth experiencing, but the novel’s depth and complexity make it the richer of the two.

In 'Blindness', fear is portrayed as an all-consuming force that drives humanity to its darkest corners. The novel shows how the sudden onset of blindness in an unnamed city creates chaos, stripping away societal norms and exposing raw human instinct. The fear of the unknown—what caused the blindness, how it spreads, and whether it’s permanent—fuels paranoia and selfishness. People hoard food, abandon their loved ones, and turn violent. The quarantine facility becomes a microcosm of this fear, with inmates forming factions and resorting to brutality to survive. Yet, the novel also subtly explores how fear can be a catalyst for resilience. The doctor’s wife, who pretends to be blind to stay with her husband, embodies this. Her fear for her husband’s safety drives her to protect him and others, even when it means risking her own life. The narrative suggests that while fear can bring out the worst in people, it can also reveal unexpected strength and compassion. The ending, where the blindness inexplicably lifts, leaves readers questioning whether the real blindness was the inability to see humanity’s potential for kindness amidst fear.