Tertuliano Máximo Afonso is a divorced high school history teacher who spends his nights reading about Mesopotamian civilizations.

Posing as a film student and using his girlfriend's address, he sends a letter to the production company asking to be put in contact with the actor.

His relationship with his girlfriend, Maria da Paz, suffers because he refuses to disclose his motives to her.

After acquiring the actor's phone number and address, Tertuliano stalks his double, António Claro, and eventually telephones him.

He visits the production company office and retrieves the letter Tertuliano authored and sent in Maria's name.

Donning the fake beard, António stakes out Maria's apartment and, finding her very attractive, he follows her to work.

The next day, he buys a newspaper to learn the details of the accident: a head-on collision with a truck.

Tertuliano returns to António's house and reveals his identity to Helena, explaining that the man who died was her husband.

Alberto Manguel in The Guardian said Saramago did not push the concept of the double far enough, noting that every culture plays with this idea.

Since the immutable laws of nature insist that something cannot exist in two places at the same time, a man and his double cannot both remain alive: one of the two must vanish for the order of the universe to be respected.

It is no unfair disclosure to say that a death is the novel's conclusion.Jonathan Carroll of The Washington Post criticized the novel, saying that he displays:[2] ...an obvious archness, an authorial sneer at the fantastical subject matter that quickly distances the reader from any emotional involvement with either the character or his situation.

As a result, we don't care what happens to Afonso or how he ends up.John Banville in The New York Times wrote of The Double: "His take on the theme is clever, alarming and blackly funny..."[3] Banville continues about Saramago's work: "He has Kafka's petrified detachment, Celine's merry ferocity and the headlong, unstoppable style of the Beckett of Malone Dies and The Unnamable.

[5] Denis Villeneuve directed a Canadian thriller feature film, Enemy in 2013, with a screenplay adapted by Javier Gullón from this novel.

[6][7] The novel shares a quote with the film, shown in the opening scene:[8] "Chaos is order yet undeciphered."