The central theme of the book is that the characters are blind to the thoughts and needs of others, focusing only on their own obsessions. The novel depicts the conflict between idealism and materialism and consists of absurd misunderstandings. It is also an allegory of the conflict between a mind that only thinks and the harsh realities of the world.
Professor Kien always misinterprets the world outside books. Surrounded by his huge library, he lives a quiet and solitary life, removed from the world. His excessive love for books and his fear of people make him even more isolated. One of Professor Kien's misconceptions is that his housekeeper Therese Krumbholz is interested in his precious books and is in love with him. Therese gains Kien's trust by pretending that she, too, has a passion for books and takes care of the collection. However, after her marriage to Kien, Therese stops pretending and shows her true colors. The maid's blindness is that she is materialistic and insensitive to other people and their feelings. After a while, Therese starts stealing and selling Kien's books, first kicks him out of his room and moves in with him, abuses him, cheats on him and finally kicks him out of his own house. Kien leaves his home and his huge library and drifts into the underworld. He falls into streets he has never been to, mistakes a malicious dwarf he meets in a run-down bar that could be called a dive for a friend and is exposed to horrible events. What happens in these parts of the book is quite dark and depressing. Canetti's close interest in the relationship between the masses and power in the early 1930s, when the footsteps of the Nazis were just beginning to be heard, is intensely felt in this part of the book. He describes a period when Germany was still recovering from the defeat of the first world war and the psychology of defeat paved the way for Nazism, and the ordinary people who would become the base of Nazism in this period.
At the end of the book, Kien's anti-character, his brother George Kien, appears. George is a surgeon and psychologist, very good with women, unlike the Professor, and a sociable person. With his brother's help, Kien takes his house back and burns it down with his books, which he does not want to give up and share, which he thinks are more important than anything else, and takes his books with him when he leaves the world.
"The characters of The Blinding are all extraordinary people who arouse discomfort in the reader. Although they differ from each other socioculturally, their paths cross around certain defining characteristics such as greed, fixed-mindedness, selfishness, misogyny, abnormal behavior, neurotic tendencies and being trapped in their own world of thought. Each figure represents someone who is too extreme to be real and too much a part of life to be imaginary” (Çoraklı and Gürer, 2022). In his novel, Canetti criticizes "intellectuals" who have a great deal of knowledge but keep their knowledge to themselves, despise their surroundings and do not leave the ivory tower. The novel is undoubtedly one of the most important novels of its time and even today. Its depiction of evil and chaos is unique. He dealt with every aspect of the morbid distortions of a collapsing society, and chose the "intellectual" as a victim among the characters he created from all walks of life and all temperaments. This is exactly the message the reader should think about...
Res. Asst. Merve TOSUN
