All The Names

Jose Saramago

All The Names is the second of Jose Saramago's that I've read (the first being Blindness) and, like Blindness, it didn't disappoint in any way. I consider Blindness to be one of the most exceptional reading experiences I've ever had, and while I don't necessarily rank All The Names that highly, it does warrant praise -- at least in my humble non-reviewer opinion. Loosely, it's the story of a clerk, Senor Jose, who is employed by the government registry and who spends his days largely involved in the tedium of recording births, marriages, divorces and deaths and filing them accordingly. Jose is single, apparently without family, and in many ways the registry represents the totality of his existence. His sole pastime is collecting news articles about people who have achieved celebrity and garnering other information about them -- which is where the registry necessarily factors into his personal life. We meet Jose as he's gathering information on a certain individual of standing and comes away not only with that person's registry card but also the card of a woman that, unknown to Jose, had attached itself to the card that he'd intended to retrieve. That card -- and the woman it pertains to -- become a fascination to Jose and the catalyst for what follows. The book is about his search and what he risks to perpetuate it but even more it's an exploration of the dynamics of human compassion and relationships -- and the meaning of an individual's life in the grand scheme of things. I loved it and rated it a 5 accordingly.