Death with Interruptions
By: José Saramago / Translated By: Margaret Jull Costa / Narrated By: Paul Baymer
Length: 7 hrs and 43 mins
Social Commentary? Check. A Bit O’ Sweetness…? Uhm, well, yeah… Go Death, Go!
It’s always a grand thing to get a new Subscriber, especially of an individual who’s been so kind as to provide a Favorite Title. It’s never a grand thing, however, to find that said Fave Book is nary to be had as an audiobook (Sacrilege!!!).
So what’s a good Accomplice to do in such a case?
Why, find SOMEthing that kinda sorta, maybe even just vaaaaguely offers a hint of the flavor? In this case, the favorite read was The Invention of Morel by Adolfo Bioy Casares, so we here at Audiobook Accomplice searched far and wide, flung possibilities around, and we finally decided upon a José Saramago, cuz the man had no compunction about writing How Things Could’ve Happened (Think: The Elephant’s Journey).
And our choice for our new Subscriber? Let’s go with him writing How Things COULD Happen, you know, like, what if Death decided, Ya know what? I’m just not gonna anymore…
Sooo: Death with Interruptions!
In a nameless and fictional country, on the first of January, nobody dies. And so it continues. At first, at least from the hoi polloi, there are celebrations across the land as tho’ a common enemy has been defeated. At last, Immortality!
And from leaders? Consternation, esPECially from the Church: If there is no death, there can be no Resurrection… Uhm, that means there can be no Religion… So right away Saramago is fearlessly, yes, Going There with social commentary, taking not cheap shots so much as well-guided thrusts at organized religion. Okay okay okay, maybe it IS a cheap shot, but in Saramago’s hands, with some pretty biting lines, it comes off as wry and hiLARious even as it makes the Listener ponder.
Saramago continues with his musings as all descends into near-madness. No Death does NOT mean all is well and good. Those who SHOULD’VE died are held in a state of Constant Dying, incapable of recapturing health, unable to die. And for the State? Leaders who should die and pass the torch quite simply do not. And for insurance companies? Policies are worthless. And for funeral directors?
Uhm, well, they’re all relegated to burying dogs and cats and birds and the occasional reptile. Cuz those critters still die; it’s just the humans in that particular country who cannot. Funeral directors, morticians, are PISSED…
Along the way, as the country descends into near-Chaos, ideas come to pass: P’raps journeying to neighboring countries is a way out of it all. And so the dying are taken across borders where they instantly die. This, Saramago posits, offers opportunities for organized crime to carry out such expeditions, and so the maphia (Spelled with the “ph”) is born and soon takes control.
Does all this sound like only social commentary? Well, it is, but you see, Death with Interruptions, while plumbing the depths for the first part, soon goes onto what feels like a Book Two, where death (She spells it with a small “d”) is personified, and her tale is told. Things get to be a bit much in the country, so death announces: Back in Business, and the backlog is taken care of, much to the shock and dismay of those who might’ve expected Grandpa to die, but certainly not the husband who has an accident.
So death dials it back, creates missives to the doomed to let them know to get their affairs in order, say their goodbyes, etc. etc. But one missive returns to her time and time again. A so-so cellist is s’posed to die, but his letter never quite makes it to him, keeps coming back to death unopened.
This whole time Paul Boehmer is doing a MASTERFUL job at narration; he was sooo good that I wondered if I gave him short shrift in Boooo-ing his reading of Ernie Pyle’s Brave Men. Why, thought I to m’self: He’s wonderful here! …and that’s where I discovered Death with Interruptions is Paul NOT-Boehmer, but Baymer. Oy, I stunned myself. -But- BAYMER did sooo well, okay okay okay. I mean, Saramago really gets into the social, political, religious, even completely and unutterably personal ramifications of a world without death, so it could’ve been a Snoozefest. It wasn’t. And death as a woman? It could’ve been a wretched “female” voice done by a male narrator. It wasn’t. So well done, sir: And I TOTALLY understand: BAYMER!
Dunno if this’ll tick our wonderful New Subscriber’s boxes of things necessary for a Fave, but I must say that I found it pretty delightful, even if the world without death came off rather preachy (All whilst decrying preachers, but there you are). And tho’ I was startled by the sudden break between Commentary and Story, I must say that I enjoyed both quite well indeed.
So might I make this humble offer to a fellow Accomplice? All with the reassurance that? If EVER The Invention of Morel should be released as an audiobook, dude!
I’m soooo THERE!!!
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