The Country of the Blind (H. G. Wells) — graded reader B1–B2

The Country of the Blind

A graded reader · H. G. Wells · B1–B2

Warm-up

• Have you ever been high in the mountains? What did you love, or hate, about it?

• Would you like to live in a small village far from everyone? Why or why not?

• Have you ever been the new person in a group? How did it feel?

• What's a custom in your country that surprises visitors?

The author and the book

H. G. Wells (1866–1946)

Herbert George Wells was born in 1866 in Bromley, Kent. His father was a shopkeeper and a professional cricketer, but the shop made very little money, and the family was often poor.

In 1874, as a young boy, Wells broke his leg and had to stay in bed. His father brought him books from the local library, and he fell in love with reading.

As a teenager, he was sent to work for a draper in Southsea, selling cloth for thirteen hours a day and sleeping in a room with the other boys. He hated it. Then, in 1884, he won a scholarship to study science in London. His teacher was T. H. Huxley, a famous supporter of Charles Darwin.

Wells became one of the fathers of science fiction, with The Time Machine (1895), The Invisible Man (1897) and The War of the Worlds (1898). He died in London in 1946, aged 79.

"The Country of the Blind" first appeared in The Strand Magazine in April 1904.

Key words

mountaineer

legend

proverb

a person who climbs mountains, sometimes as a guide for others

an old story that many people tell, but that may not be true

a short, well-known saying that gives advice or a general truth

elders

sight

the older, respected people who lead a community

the ability to see

Let's talk

• Wells trained as a scientist before he wrote stories. How might science help a writer?

• An old proverb says, "In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king." What does it mean?

• Who decides what is "normal" in a society?

• The story is called "The Country of the Blind". What might happen to a stranger who arrives there?

PART 1 OF 4

The valley at the end of the world

PART 1 · THE VALLEY AT THE END OF THE WORLD

Far away in the Andes of Ecuador, among wild mountains of snow and ice, there is a hidden valley. People call it the Country of the Blind.

Long ago, a few families escaped from a cruel Spanish ruler and climbed through terrible gorges into this valley. It was a wonderful place. It had sweet water, rich green meadows, fruit bushes and pine forests, and it never rained or snowed. Their llamas grew fat, and the families were happy.

Then a strange disease came. Every child born in the valley was blind.

One man went down the mountains to find help. In those days, people thought illness was a punishment for sin, so he went to buy holy objects. But while he was away, a volcano exploded and the whole land shook.

One side of a mountain came down like thunder, and the valley was closed forever. The man never found his way back. He went blind himself, and died working in the mines. But his story became a legend.

Up in the valley, the old people slowly lost their sight, and the children never had it. But the valley was an easy place to live, and the people learned to live without seeing. Fifteen generations passed.

Then a man came into the valley from the outside world.

His name was Nunez. He was a mountain guide from near Quito, clever and confident. A group of English climbers hired him to climb Parascotopetl, a mountain nobody had ever climbed. One night, they camped on a shelf of rock high on the mountain.

PART 1 · THE VALLEY AT THE END OF THE WORLD

In the morning, Nunez was gone.

He had slipped and fallen a thousand feet, and an avalanche carried him down, down, down. When at last he stopped, he was buried in soft snow, but not one bone was broken. He worked himself free and saw the stars. He looked up at the enormous cliff he had fallen down, and he laughed and cried at the same time.

When he woke, birds were singing. He climbed down towards a green valley with stone houses.

The valley was strange. The paths were paved with black and white stones, with a little kerb along each side. The houses stood in neat rows, but they had no windows, and their walls were painted in a wild patchwork of grey, brown and dark slate.

"The man who painted that," thought Nunez, "must have been as blind as a bat."

Then he saw three men carrying buckets along a path. He shouted. They stopped and turned their heads this way and that, but they did not look at him.

"Blind," he thought. "They must be blind."

Close up, he saw that their eyelids were closed and sunken. His heart jumped. This was the Country of the Blind from the old stories! And through his head ran an old proverb, again and again:

"In the Country of the Blind, the One-eyed Man is King."

He walked towards them, smiling, like a young man walking into his future.

Book club

PART 1 · THE VALLEY AT THE END OF THE WORLD

1. Why was the valley cut off from the rest of the world?

2. How did Nunez end up in the valley?

3. What did Nunez notice about the houses, and what did it make him think?

4. The first settlers thought illness was a punishment for sin. How have explanations for illness changed?

5. If you found a hidden people, would you want to lead them, learn from them, or leave?

6. How do you think the villagers will react to Nunez?

PART 2 OF 4

A wild man from the rocks

PART 2 · A WILD MAN FROM THE ROCKS

"A man," said one of them, in a strange old Spanish. "A man, or a spirit, coming down from the rocks."

"I come from over the mountains," said Nunez, "from the world where men can see. From near Bogota, a city of a hundred thousand people."

"See?" said the first man, Pedro. "See?"

Together, the three men reached out and took hold of him. Their hands moved over his face, his hair, his coat.

"A strange creature, Correa," said Pedro. "Feel his hair. Like a llama's."

"Rough, like the rocks he came from," said Correa. "Perhaps he will grow finer."

"I can see," said Nunez. He turned, and fell over Pedro's bucket.

"His senses are not finished yet," said the third man. "He stumbles, and says words with no meaning. Lead him by the hand."

Nunez laughed and let them lead him. They knew nothing about sight. Well, he would teach them.

"Bogota!" he told the crowd that gathered. "I come from Bogota!" So they called him Bogota.

They took him into a house as dark as night, where the elders sat. He fell over someone's feet, and many hands grabbed him.

"He is newly made," said Correa. "He stumbles, and mixes his words with nonsense."

Nunez tried to tell the elders about the great world, but they understood nothing. For fifteen generations they had lived without sight, and its words had lost their meaning. The oldest man explained how the world really was: an empty space in the rocks, with a smooth roof of rock above it. In the air lived angels, who sang and fluttered but could never be touched. Nunez was puzzled, until he thought of the birds.

PART 2 · A WILD MAN FROM THE ROCKS

The old man explained that people worked in the cold and slept in the warm. Nunez's night was their day.

"You must learn," the old man said kindly. "Now sleep."

But Nunez didn't sleep. "No senses yet!" he laughed. "They don't know they're insulting their king."

That evening, the setting sun turned the snow to gold, and he thanked God for his eyes.

"Bogota! Come here!" called a voice.

Nunez smiled. He would show them what sight could do. Silently, he stepped off the path.

"Don't walk on the grass, Bogota. That's not allowed."

Nunez stopped, amazed. The man had heard him.

"Has no one told you," Nunez said, "that in the Country of the Blind, the One-eyed Man is King?"

"What is blind?" the man asked carelessly.

For days Nunez tried to explain sight. He described the mountains, the sky and the sunrise, but they told him his thoughts were wicked. One morning he said, "Pedro is coming along path Seventeen. Soon he'll be here." But Pedro turned onto path Ten and went back towards the wall. They laughed at Nunez, and Pedro was his enemy after that.

At last, Nunez lost his patience. He picked up a spade. He would knock one or two of them down. Then they would know who was master.

Book club

PART 2 · A WILD MAN FROM THE ROCKS

1. What did the villagers decide Nunez was, and why?

2. What did the elders believe was above the valley?

3. Why did Nunez's test with Pedro on path Seventeen go wrong?

4. From the villagers' point of view, does Nunez make sense? Are they wrong to doubt him?

5. Have you ever tried to explain something to people who had no idea what you meant?

6. Nunez has picked up a spade. What do you think he will do?

PART 3 OF 4

Come off the grass

PART 3 · COME OFF THE GRASS

But then Nunez discovered something new about himself. He could not hit a blind man in cold blood.

The people turned their heads towards him, listening. They knew exactly what he was holding.

"Put that spade down," said one.

Instead, Nunez pushed the man against a wall and ran out of the village, across the meadows.

Soon a long line of men with spades and sticks came after him. They walked slowly, talking quietly. Every few steps, the whole line stopped, smelled the air and listened. The first time, Nunez laughed. After that, he didn't. One man found his footprints in the grass and followed them, bending low.

"Bogota! Where are you?"

"I'm going to do what I like in this valley!" Nunez shouted. "You are blind, and I can see. Leave me alone!"

"Bogota! Put down that spade, and come off the grass!"

They moved in quickly. He swung the spade, and a man fell with a cry of pain. Another man rushed at the sound of his feet. Nunez panicked. He threw the spade and ran, falling and getting up again, until he found a little door in the valley wall and escaped onto the rocks outside.

For two days and nights he stayed out there, with no food and no shelter. The nights were freezing. He tried to catch a llama, but the llamas spat at him. The old proverb now sounded like a joke.

PART 3 · COME OFF THE GRASS

At last, weak and shaking, he crawled back to the gate.

"I was mad," he said. "But I was only newly made."

"And what is above us?" they asked.

"About ten times the height of ten men, there is a roof of rock," he said, crying. "Very, very smooth. Please, give me food, or I'll die."

They whipped him, and gave him the heaviest, simplest work in the valley. But when he fell ill, they nursed him kindly.

So Nunez became a citizen of the Country of the Blind. He worked for Yacob, a kind old man, and he fell in love with Yacob's youngest daughter, Medina-saroté. The valley did not think she was beautiful. Her face was too sharp, her voice too strong, and she had long eyelashes.

But to Nunez she was the most beautiful thing in the world. Slowly, she began to love him too.

The elders said no to a marriage. To them, Nunez was an idiot, below the level of a real man. But Medina-saroté cried on her father's shoulder, and at last the valley's great doctor had an idea.

"I have examined Bogota," said the doctor. "His brain is affected. Those strange things called eyes are diseased. They move, and they disturb his brain. To cure him, we need only a simple operation. We must remove them."

"And then he will be normal?" asked Yacob.

"Perfectly normal. A fine citizen."

"Thank heaven for science!" said old Yacob, and he hurried off to tell Nunez the happy news.

Book club

PART 3 · COME OFF THE GRASS

1. Why did Nunez run instead of hitting the villagers at first?

2. What did Nunez have to say before they let him back in?

3. Why did the elders say no to the marriage?

4. Nunez agreed the sky was a roof of rock just to get food. Was that weak, or sensible?

5. Can you think of times when societies tried to "cure" people simply for being different?

6. What will Nunez decide? What would you decide in his place?

PART 4 OF 4

Sunrise

PART 4 · SUNRISE

Nunez did not receive the happy news happily.

"Anyone would think," said Yacob, "that you didn't care about my daughter."

It was Medina-saroté who persuaded him.

"You don't want me to lose my sight?" he asked her.

She shook her head.

"My world is sight," he said. "The flowers, the lichens on the rocks, the clouds, the sunsets and the stars. And you. Your sweet face, your kind lips, your beautiful hands. Without my eyes, I can only touch you and hear you, and never see you again. I'll have to live under that roof of rock. You wouldn't want that?"

"I wish," she said, "sometimes... you wouldn't talk like that."

"Like what?"

"I know it's pretty. It's your imagination. I love it. But now..."

He felt cold. "Now?"

She sat very still. He understood. He felt angry at fate, but he also felt pity for her, because she could not understand.

"If I agreed to this?" he said at last, very gently.

She threw her arms around him, crying. "Oh, if you would! If only you would!"

For a week before the operation, Nunez could not sleep. He had said yes, but he still wasn't sure.

On his last morning, he went to say goodbye to Medina-saroté before she slept.

"Tomorrow," he said, "I shall see no more."

"Dear heart!" she said. "They will hurt you only a little. You are doing this for me. I will repay you."

PART 4 · SUNRISE

He held her and looked at her sweet face for the last time. "Goodbye," he whispered.

He meant to go to a quiet meadow full of white flowers and wait there. But as he walked, he lifted his eyes and saw the morning, coming down the mountains like an angel in golden armour.

He did not turn aside. He walked through the wall and out onto the rocks, his eyes on the shining ice and snow. He thought of the great free world beyond: Bogota, with its palaces and fountains; the long river journey to the sea; and the sky, not a small circle as here, but a huge blue arch full of stars.

He studied the mountain wall. Up that gully, then that chimney in the rock, then those pines... perhaps.

He looked back at the village. He thought of Medina-saroté. She seemed small and far away.

Then, very carefully, he began to climb.

When the sun set, he was far and high above the valley. His clothes were torn, and his arms and legs were bloody. But he lay there as if he were resting.

Around him, the mountain tops were bright with light and fire. A tiny orange lichen grew on the rock beside his face. Above him was the endless sky. He lay smiling, as if it were enough simply to have escaped from the valley where he had once hoped to be King.

The sunset faded, and the night came. And still he lay there, peaceful and content, under the cold, clear stars.

Book club

PART 4 · SUNRISE

1. Why did Nunez not want to lose his sight?

2. What did Medina-saroté want him to do?

3. What changed Nunez's mind on his last morning?

4. Was Medina-saroté selfish, or did she love him in the only way she knew?

5. Did Nunez make the right choice? What did he lose, and what did he gain?

Big questions

1

Nunez arrived expecting to be king. Where did he go wrong?

2

Who was right about the world: Nunez or the villagers? Can both be right in some way?

3

The villagers wanted to make Nunez "normal". Who decides what normal means?

4

Is it ever right to change yourself to be accepted by the people you love?

5

Wells ends with Nunez under the stars. Do you think he survives? Does it matter?

6

When have you been the outsider who saw things differently? What happened?

TEACHER'S REFERENCE · SKIP OR DELETE BEFORE CLASS

Answer key

Part 1 · 1 A volcano exploded and the land shook. One side of a mountain fell and closed the way in forever.

Part 1 · 2 He was a guide on a climb of Parascotopetl. He slipped at night, fell a thousand feet and was carried down by an avalanche. Then he climbed down into the valley.

Part 1 · 3 They had no windows, and the walls were painted in a wild patchwork of colours. He thought the painter must have been blind.

Part 2 · 1 A new, unfinished creature, a "wild man" from the rocks: he stumbled, fell over things and used words like "see" that meant nothing to them.

Part 2 · 2 A smooth roof of rock.

Part 2 · 3 Pedro turned onto path Ten and went back towards the wall, so he never arrived.

Part 3 · 1 He discovered that he could not hit a blind man in cold blood.

Part 3 · 2 That he had been mad, that he could not "see", and that there was a smooth roof of rock above the world.

Part 3 · 3 They thought Nunez was an idiot, below the level of a real man.

Part 4 · 1 Sight was his world: he loved the flowers, the sky, the sunsets and stars, and seeing Medina-saroté's face.

Part 4 · 2 She wanted him to agree to the operation and have his eyes removed.

Part 4 · 3 He saw the sunrise coming down the mountains and thought of the great free world beyond the valley.