# The best books by José Saramago

The novels by the only Portuguese-language Nobel laureate in Literature most recommended by critics and readers, ordered by consensus across the lists.

- 20 votes · 15 items
- Jul 21, 2022 · João Carvalho
- https://even.best/en/l/302/the-best-books-by-jose-saramago

## Top 15

1. **Blindness** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — 1995. An epidemic of 'white blindness' and the doctor's wife, the only one who can still see.
2. **Baltasar and Blimunda** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — 1982. Baltasar, Blimunda, Father Bartolomeu's flying machine and the building of the Mafra convent.
3. **The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — 1984. Pessoa's heteronym returns to Lisbon in 1936 and talks with the poet's ghost.
4. **The Double** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — 2002. A history teacher discovers an actor identical to him in a film.
5. **The Cave** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — 2000. A potter and the all-devouring Centre; a retelling of Plato's allegory.
6. **Skylight** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — 2011 (written in 1953). The early novel Saramago kept in a drawer, published posthumously.
7. **The Gospel According to Jesus Christ** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — 1991. A human and controversial life of Jesus; the Portuguese government vetoed its nomination for a European prize.
8. **Death with Interruptions** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — 2005. In a nameless country, death stops killing from 1 January.
9. **The Stone Raft** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — 1986. The Iberian Peninsula breaks away from Europe and drifts across the Atlantic.
10. **The History of the Siege of Lisbon** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — 1989. A proofreader adds a 'not' to the history of the conquest of Lisbon from the Moors.
11. **All the Names** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — 1997. Senhor José, a clerk at the Central Registry, obsessed with an unknown woman.
12. **Raised from the Ground** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — 1980. Three generations of Alentejo peasants, from the great estates to the Carnation Revolution.
13. **Cain** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — 2009. Cain travels through the Old Testament; his last novel published in his lifetime.
14. **The Elephant's Journey** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — 2008. The elephant Solomon travels from Lisbon to Vienna in the 16th century.
15. **Seeing** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — 2004. In the same capital as Blindness, 83% of voters cast blank ballots.

How is this ranking ordered? By people's votes: each ▲ adds a point and each ▼ takes one away. Anyone can vote and add what is missing.