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one poor researcher became lost in the labyrinthine catacombs of the archive of the dead, having come to the Central Registry in order to carry out some genealogical research he had been commissioned to undertake. He was discovered, almost miraculously, after a week, starving, thirsty, exhausted, delirious, having survived thanks to the desperate measure of ingesting enormous quantities of old documents that neither lingered in the stomach nor nourished, since they melted in the mouth without requiring any chewing.The nondescript Senhor José labors long and thanklessly among the archives; his is a tepid, lonely life with only one small hobby to leaven his leisure hours: he collects "news items about those people in his country who, for good reasons and bad, had become famous." One night, it occurs to him that "something fundamental was missing from his collection, that is, the origin, the root, the source, in other words, the actual birth certificate of these famous people"--and that the information is within easy reach on the other side of a connecting door that separates his meager lodgings from the Registry itself. And so begins Senhor José's midnight raids on the stacks as he shuttles between the Registry and his own room bearing precious records that he carefully copies before returning them to their rightful places. Still, this minor aberration might have remained the clerk's only transgression if not for a simple act of fate: one night, along with his celebrity records, he accidentally picks up a birth certificate belonging to an ordinary, unknown woman--a woman who becomes suddenly more important than all the others precisely because she is unknown. Celebrity is cast aside as Senhor José begins a search for this mysterious quarry--a quest that will lead him into conflict with his superior, the Registrar, and ensnare him in the kind of messy personal histories and tangled relationships he has thus far avoided in his own life.
A recurring theme in many of Saramago's novels is the very human struggle between withdrawal and connection. Whether it is the Iberian peninsula literally breaking off from the rest of Europe in The Stone Raft or an entire country afflicted by a devastating malady in Blindness, he is fascinated by the effects of isolation on the human soul and, correspondingly, the redemptive power of compassion. All the Names continues to mine this rich vein as the repressed clerk follows his unknown Ariadne's thread out of the labyrinth of his own strangled psyche and into life. Readers will find here Saramago's trademark love of the absurd, his brilliant imagery and idiosyncratic punctuation, as well as the unflinching yet tender honesty with which he chronicles the human condition. --Alix Wilber --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
From Publishers Weekly
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Above the door frame is a long, narrow plaque of enamelled metal. Read the first page
Concordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
A study in self-discovery,
This review is from: All the Names (Paperback)
As with most of Saramago's work, "All the Names" resolves itself in a rather disconcerting way. With simple language that often disguises the true depth of his meaning, the author builds up the story with great skill, leading the reader to believe that some calamitous event is inevitable. That the narrative goes down unexpected paths without disappointing is a testament to the author's brilliance.It also speaks to the nature of the universal themes that Saramago tackles with unmatched skill. As we ponder the fate of the protagonist we wonder about ourselves. About our own temerity or bravery, as it were. About our willingness to take that step past the door that divides the safety zone of the known self to the tortuous path of self discovery. How would I proceed in situation identical to Senhor Jose's, the reader is compelled to ask. Senhor Jose, the protagonist, embodies the thing within each of us, be it a flicker or weighty desire, which propels us to decide whether we want to know more about ourselves. Even if that trigger comes disguised as a quest for a different purpose. At the start of his quest, Senhor Jose is seeking answers about someone else, but his ultimate discoveries are about himself. The protagonist gets himself deeper and deeper, and like an addict he keeps telling himself he can abandon his quest at any point, but both he and the reader know that the deeper he gets the more powerless he becomes to do anything but to see his mission through. There is an undercurrent of inevitability, of being part of a machinery over which an individual has little, if any, control. With economy, elegance and simplicity, Saramago takes through the winding paths of the human psyche. Other books worthy of mention by this author are his masterpiece "Blindness" and "The Stone Raft."
5.0 out of 5 stars
"The workings of chance are infinite.",
By
This review is from: All the Names (Hardcover)
Senhor Jose has worked as a civil servant in the Central Registry of Births, Marriages and Deaths for twenty-five years. When not working he engages in his covert hobby of collecting articles and photographs of celebrities and supplementing them with vital statistics from his office. While secretly extracting index cards from a file in the Central Registry he comes across a card of an unknown non-celebrity woman that is the catalyst for the journey at the center of ALL THE NAMES. Fascinated by the circumstances of the Unknown Woman's life Senhor Jose engages in a clandestine operation of trying to find her whereabouts. Jose Saramago performs a splendid job of getting into the head of Senhor Jose by highlighting the deductions of internal thought and inquiry and protecting scenarios of anticipated dialogue with others, as demonstrated by his internal dialogues with the ceiling in his house. Saramago's method resulted in a highly enjoyable and nuanced protagonist that is believable and three-dimensional. While reading ALL THE NAMES it is apparent that Saramago's communist beliefs are projected in this novel by the descriptions of the Central Registry by including descriptions of the strict hierarchy of employees and the maximum efficiency of work processes. Even when Senhor Jose goes to another workplace the same structure is accentuated. ALL THE NAMES is one of my favorite novels by Jose Saramago and was a real treat to read.
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Quiet Gem of a Book,
By Totally Anonymous (Private) - See all my reviews
This review is from: All the Names (Paperback)
Except for the much-neglected book THE YEAR OF THE DEATH OF RICARDO REIS, I think ALL THE NAMES is Jose Saramago's most melancholy and meditative novel. It's a simpler, more straightforward story than THE YEAR OF THE DEATH OF RICARDO REIS, but one that certainly carries as much depth.ALL THE NAMES is set in an unnamed city that is surely Lisbon. Just as the locale is not specifically named, neither are the characters save for one, the protagonist, Senhor Jose, a low level clerk in the Central Registry of Births, Marriages and Deaths. The filing system in the Central Registry is such that the records of the dead are stored closest to the clerks and are, therefore, more accessible, while those of the living are stored farthest away. Senhor Jose has but one hobby with which to fill his dull and boring days. He collects press clippings about famous persons and then checks their records to annotate his clippings with facts about their birth, marriages, etc. One evening while indulging his hobby (I hesitate to call it a passion), Senhor Jose mistakenly opens the record of an unknown woman, a woman with whom he becomes obsessed. ALL THE NAMES is a book that begins slowly, but picks up the pace as Senhor Jose searches for the nameless woman. Sitting in his room, which adjoins the registry, Senhor Jose stares at the ceiling and converses with it. Incredibly, the ceiling sees itself as the all-knowing eye of God. Senhor Jose's dialogues with the ceiling and his trip to the General Cemetery contain the book's most magnificent writing, writing that is, at times, quite hallucinatory and baroque, something I really liked. I think ALL THE NAMES is worth reading simply for the "ceiling" and "cemetery" set pieces alone. Although ALL THE NAMES doesn't have the power of BLINDNESS or the baroque complexity of THE YEAR OF THE DEATH OF RICARDO REIS, it is still a masterpiece and its theme, unlike that of THE YEAR OF THE DEATH OF RICARDO REIS or THE HISTORY OF THE SIEGE OF LISBON, while still revolving around identity, is more universally understood. If you're new to the work of Jose Saramago, ALL THE NAMES might be a good place to begin. If you've only read his more popular works, like BLINDNESS and THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO JESUS CHRIST, and you liked those books, then you really can't afford to pass up ALL THE NAMES. It is a quiet gem of a book and you're in for a real treat.
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