num_pages: 309
description: Blindness is the story of an unexplained mass epidemic of blindness afflicting nearly everyone in an unnamed city, and the social breakdown that swiftly follows. The novel follows the misfortunes of a handful of characters who are among the first to be stricken and centers on "the doctor's wife," her husband, several of his patients, and assorted others, thrown together by chance. This group bands together in a family-like unit to survive by their wits and by the unexplained good fortune that the doctor’s wife has escaped the blindness. The sudden onset and unexplained origin and nature of the blindness cause widespread panic, and the social order rapidly unravels as the government attempts to contain the apparent contagion and keep order via increasingly repressive and inept measures.
language: English
title: Blindness
titlecomplete: Blindness
characters: The girl with the dark glasses, The boy with the squint, The doctor (Blindness), The old man with the black eye patch, The first blind man's wife, The first blind man, The doctor's wife, The car thief
genres: Fiction, Science Fiction, Horror, Literature, Classics, Novels, Portugal, Nobel Prize, Dystopia, Portuguese Literature
ratings_count: 276339
places: Portugal
series: Blindness
awards: awardedAt: 915177600000
name: Premio San Clemente Rosalía-Abanca
category: Lingua estranxeira, awardedAt: 915177600000
name: Dublin Literary Award
publisher: Vintage Classics