Harold Bloom on José Saramago

“The most gifted novelist alive in the world today ... one of the last titans of an expiring literary genre.”

“[The Gospel According to Jesus Christ] is an awesome work, imaginatively superior to any other life of Jesus, including the four canonical Gospels.”

“José Saramago will be a permanent part of the Western canon. ... In all of his wonderful meditations upon the ruefulness of our lives, there is always the spirit of laughter beckoning us in the art of somehow going on. His achievement is one of the enlargements of life.”