José Saramago on Democracy

Nobel laureate José Saramago, the 86-year-old Portuguese writer who divides his life between Lisbon and Lanzarote, says in an interview with Maya Jaggi in the Guardian Review of 22 November 2008: 'I'm doubtful of democracy. [...]. Participation in political life is insufficient. People are called in every four years, and in between, the government does what it wants. That's not specific to Portugal'. Saramago describes himself as a 'hormonal communist – just as there's a hormone that makes my beard grow every day', and says of Barack Obama: 'It's a beautiful moment, democracy in action, when millions were mobilised – including people who had never voted before – for a new candidate, and a black candidate at that. It's a kind of revolution.' I doubt if many people saw it as a revolution, but the general idea is understood. Anyway, for an interesting interview on a major writer whose first job was as a car mechanic, this is Maya Jaggi‘s interview with José Saramago.