“The Double” by José Saramago (post 6): Narrator’s two, or two groups of, alternate personalities, one modestly transcribing, the other boldly omniscient.

As previously noted, the narrator has continually made plural self-reference—“we,” “us,” etc.—which should alert the reader to the fact that the narrator consists of more than one personality.

However, since the narrator had not yet expressed any self-contradiction, I had thought that the narrator’s multiple personalities were similar to, and in agreement with, each other.

But the following two comments by the narrator are contradictory, and therefore indicate that the narrator is composed of two, or two groups of, alternate personalities, one modestly transcribing, the other boldly omniscient:

“…do not count on us, mere transcribers of other people’s thoughts and faithful copyists of their actions, to anticipate the next steps…” (1, p. 189).

“…the privilege we enjoy of knowing everything that is going to happen up until the very last page of this story, apart from those things that might still need to be invented, allows us to say that tomorrow…(1, p. 248)…[and to offer] “a bold opinion” (1, p. 251).

1. José Saramago. The Double [2002]. Translated from the Portuguese by Margaret Jull Costa. Orlando, Harcourt, 2004.