Importance of Care and Comfort Depicted in Blindness and Memories of My Melancholy Whores
Memories of my Melancholy Whores – Gabriel García Marquez
Blindness – José Saramago
Society constantly reminds us that we cannot depend on emotional survival alone, but must also rely on someone’s help such as feeling comfort of someone else as protection. Whether it is to hold someone’s hand, lie in bed and stare at the ceiling, guide oneself in the darkness, we all need some kind of assurance that we are needed. In Memories of my Melancholy Whores by Gabriel García Marquez , a simple desire of a nameless Sunday column writer in Colombia, who was soon going to celebrate his ninetieth birthday by taking the virginity of a young girl. The columnist was wrong. He soon comes to learn that what he always needed was not the 514 women that he had sexual intercourse with since his twentieth birthday; but the care and love that this one young fourteen year old girl offered him. As too, in the novel Blindness by José Saramago; the nameless ophthalmologist struggles to be help to anyone, including himself after the disease “White Blindness” spreads throughout a country. With the help of his wife, he and other people come to care for someone who helps them without having to wait for anything in return.
Although having to rely on other people can sometimes makes you feel inferior, in other instances its better to know someone cares enough that they are there for you. The ninety year old column writer, seemed to have an ideal life; lived by himself, wasn’t committed to anyone, had no children, and although was of age, he still slept around with as many women as he pleased. Although it sounds like the life, this journalist never had an intimate relationship. He never seemed to last with a woman for more than what the night allowed them to do, and how long it took them to get dressed in the morning and move on with their lives. Gabriel García Marquez writes in Memories of my Melancholy Whores “Do whatever you want, but don’t lost that child, she said. There’s no greater
Blindness – José Saramago
Society constantly reminds us that we cannot depend on emotional survival alone, but must also rely on someone’s help such as feeling comfort of someone else as protection. Whether it is to hold someone’s hand, lie in bed and stare at the ceiling, guide oneself in the darkness, we all need some kind of assurance that we are needed. In Memories of my Melancholy Whores by Gabriel García Marquez , a simple desire of a nameless Sunday column writer in Colombia, who was soon going to celebrate his ninetieth birthday by taking the virginity of a young girl. The columnist was wrong. He soon comes to learn that what he always needed was not the 514 women that he had sexual intercourse with since his twentieth birthday; but the care and love that this one young fourteen year old girl offered him. As too, in the novel Blindness by José Saramago; the nameless ophthalmologist struggles to be help to anyone, including himself after the disease “White Blindness” spreads throughout a country. With the help of his wife, he and other people come to care for someone who helps them without having to wait for anything in return.
Although having to rely on other people can sometimes makes you feel inferior, in other instances its better to know someone cares enough that they are there for you. The ninety year old column writer, seemed to have an ideal life; lived by himself, wasn’t committed to anyone, had no children, and although was of age, he still slept around with as many women as he pleased. Although it sounds like the life, this journalist never had an intimate relationship. He never seemed to last with a woman for more than what the night allowed them to do, and how long it took them to get dressed in the morning and move on with their lives. Gabriel García Marquez writes in Memories of my Melancholy Whores “Do whatever you want, but don’t lost that child, she said. There’s no greater
Cited: Updike, John “Memories of My Melancholy Whores.” The New Yorker.com 11 July. 2005. 19 Mar. 2008 Blindness : Miller, Andrew. "Zero Visibility." New York Times 4 Oct. 1998: 1-4. Willen, Drenka. Publishers Weekly. 1998. Blindness. Jamaica Queens Central Lib, NY