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tfo7042's review
challenging
informative
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Loveable characters? Yes
5.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Sexual assault
liz_ross's review against another edition
challenging
informative
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.25
Saramago's writing style is so annoying and yet so beautiful. His way of phrasing things is unique, easily recognized and can be so incredibly perfect sometimes and yet so infuriating in other moments.
His writing style is different, unique and that surely makes him special. But his books wouldn't thrive if it didn't work. And whereas it is true that the only reason why the book got only 3.25 stars was the writing style that made it so hard to understand what was being told sometimes, it's also true that I can't imagine a better person to describe some of the scenes. Beautiful, poignant descriptions of times, people and places that envoke the images in your head with such vividness you can't help being surprised by that.
I complained so much in the beginning about the title of the English version. And while I still think that the original is a better one as more than about the lives of those two characters that make the English version title, this book is about that convent and all the lives lost, all the men forced to leave their homes to honor a promise they didn't make. To honor the promise of the King that would get all the credits in the end while the common people is forgotten. But Baltasar and Blimunda isn't that bad of a title either. And their love story, although with a quiet weird and undoubtely too rushed beginning, is an unforgetable and extraordinarily beautiful one. Especially in the end the descriptions are absolutely heartwarming and that end (which I believed that I knew, only to realize it was actually the other way around) is at the samd time heartwarming and heartbreaking, mixing both in one single emotion impossible to describe, but that Saramago painted magnificently in his last scene.
Saramago's writing style isn't for everyone, his books are not for everyone. But if you are willing to give him a chance, you will, sooner or later, realize the beauty hidden in the complexity of his writing style, the beauty that shines in those descriptions made like no one else can because no one has a writing style as unique as his.
And if you give this book a chance, if you open it willing to read it till the end, I am sure you will find its beauty too and actually enjoy the time you spend reading it, even when it takes longer than you expected, because beautiful or not, his writing style sometimes becomes to much.
Full review coming soon!
His writing style is different, unique and that surely makes him special. But his books wouldn't thrive if it didn't work. And whereas it is true that the only reason why the book got only 3.25 stars was the writing style that made it so hard to understand what was being told sometimes, it's also true that I can't imagine a better person to describe some of the scenes. Beautiful, poignant descriptions of times, people and places that envoke the images in your head with such vividness you can't help being surprised by that.
I complained so much in the beginning about the title of the English version. And while I still think that the original is a better one as more than about the lives of those two characters that make the English version title, this book is about that convent and all the lives lost, all the men forced to leave their homes to honor a promise they didn't make. To honor the promise of the King that would get all the credits in the end while the common people is forgotten. But Baltasar and Blimunda isn't that bad of a title either. And their love story, although with a quiet weird and undoubtely too rushed beginning, is an unforgetable and extraordinarily beautiful one. Especially in the end the descriptions are absolutely heartwarming and that end (which I believed that I knew, only to realize it was actually the other way around) is at the samd time heartwarming and heartbreaking, mixing both in one single emotion impossible to describe, but that Saramago painted magnificently in his last scene.
Saramago's writing style isn't for everyone, his books are not for everyone. But if you are willing to give him a chance, you will, sooner or later, realize the beauty hidden in the complexity of his writing style, the beauty that shines in those descriptions made like no one else can because no one has a writing style as unique as his.
And if you give this book a chance, if you open it willing to read it till the end, I am sure you will find its beauty too and actually enjoy the time you spend reading it, even when it takes longer than you expected, because beautiful or not, his writing style sometimes becomes to much.
Full review coming soon!
Content Warnings
Moderate: Sexual content
Minor: Rape, Sexual assault, Slavery, and Fire/Fire injury
In the lack of a more clear option, I chose Fire/Fire injury, which is meant tomake reference to death by fire, in result of the Inquistion trials, which were refered and briefly described twice.