Book Review: Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee
Disgrace follows the story of David Lurie, an ageing, white professor who falls into public disgrace after an affair with a student. He leaves for his daughter Lucy’s farm, where they fall victim to a violent and jarring attack.
The short novel is set in post-apartheid South Africa and explores the tribulations of a country in transition, cycles of oppression, hate and violence. It tackles shifting power dynamics and explores heavy topics around race, power, gender and rape.
The first part of the book focuses on David’s affair with a much younger student and the resulting scandal. It discusses the ideas of exploitation and repentance, highlighting how saying the words and admitting “guilt” are not the same as accepting fault, taking responsibility, showing remorse and atoning for it. This part also highlights the unfairness of the justice system and how in many, many ways, the perpetrators tried are often favoured by the system, and the true idea of justice is less of a priority. In this arc, it was interesting to see the stark difference in attitude between the male and female characters who dealt with David’s “trial/case.”
The second part of the book acted as a loose exploration of post-apartheid South Africa. Here we see a discussion of patriarchy, race, oppression, and hate that carries through time and history and the changing power dynamics, which we see not only in the assailants and Lucy’s reaction but also in Petrus.
Throughout the story, Coetzee draws a number of parallels between both arcs of David’s story, one where he is the perpetrator and the next where his daughter is the victim. He draws parallels between the “crimes” with ideas of repentance and atonement for past crimes. This is done using David’s own thoughts and feelings between arcs and subtle comparisons between the events.
His affair with the student is very much a result of pressure and exploitative power dynamics between a student and her professor — someone who can have a long-term influence on her academic career. It isn’t completely consensual, and neither the narrator nor David is deluded about that — “Not rape, not quite that, but undesired nevertheless, undesired to the core”. This, as well as an adamant justification of his apparent “rights to desire”, is what he uses to assure himself. The violent actions of his daughter’s assailants, however, do not merit the same justifications.
His character as an estranged father and his role as a selfish, lustful, middle-aged professor trying to navigate the changing tides are interesting to compare.
The use of the masculine voice to discuss issues of rape, especially concerning his daughter and after the scandal and his other “affairs”, was an interesting choice by Coetzee, adding layers to the discussion of patriarchy, sexual assault and gender. He is far removed from what Lucy could have experienced, and yet his voice and opinion are ever-present throughout. This can be read as commenting on how patriarchal society claims the right to speak on the sexual assault of women as well as its neglect of survivors and victims.
Similarly, the narrative voice as a white, middle-aged male while exploring post-apartheid South Africa and the changing power dynamics allows for deeper postcolonial discussion. He is a character who is trying to keep up with the changing times and the new reality of his purportedly diminished power over black people. Lurie’s subtle treatment and almost subconscious thoughts toward black characters like Petrus, especially in this setting, further highlight the discrimination or prejudices of the time.
The intent is to make you uncomfortable and question the role and morals of the characters, especially the protagonist, which Coetzee executes to perfection.
Selfish, immoral and problematic, David is unreliable as part of the free indirect narration*. This is further enhanced by the fact that the story is never narrated by or expressed by any of the other characters, all of whom are in some way or the other seen as socially subservient or inferior.
We never get to explore the unfiltered insight or feelings of characters like Lucy, Bev, Petrus, Melanie, et al who are women or black, except through the lens of David. He has sole control over guiding the readers’ interpretation or perception of everything that happens.
More than the attack itself, sometimes it was the subsequent thoughts and dialogues between characters that had me stiff, with my eyebrow furrowed and slightly shuddering.
If I were to bring out any doubts about the novel, it would be about Lucy, in how she treats or speaks about the violence she faced. It didn’t feel quite realistic. however, her reaction allowed the novel to explore the ideas of historical legacies and ideas of repayment — “tax” — or atonement and cycles of oppression.
The novel is difficult to talk about because it is so open to interpretation. Some have seen it as Coetzee’s attempt at a redemption arc for our slightly lecherous, white, middle-aged protagonist. I didn’t see it that way. At no point through the book did I think he was redeemed or that the narrative voice tried to wash away his faults.
If anything, the narration and David’s character are intentionally murky. David, as a character, pities himself and often times sees himself as the victim, but I never read the story to be redeeming him.
Through the course of the story, Lurie does go through a change in personality and attitude, executed subtly, from an arrogant, condescending city professor to a scared, mellow farm man with an attachment to dogs. Coetzee also uses Lurie’s views on sex and his realm of study to show this change through David’s work on Byron and Lady Teresa. But the change is not so drastic as to be unbelievable and didn’t read as a redemption arc. Rather he changed as a consequence of the harrowing violence he and his daughter faced and the ensuing emotional distress. In the end, he is still a problematic character with outdated, selfish views and actions. He is still an unlikeable individual.
Coetzee uses the narrative voice to force the reader to analyse a white man’s convoluted mind with adamant, immoral, selfish views and prejudices of gender and race.
In 220 pages, Coetzee manages to explore a number of heavy topics in a complex and whole way; his ability to explore characters and issues sacrificed nothing to the page count.
*Free indirect narration — “a special type of third-person narration that slips in and out of characters’ consciousness. In other words, characters’ thoughts, feelings, and words are filtered through the third-person narrator in free indirect discourse.” — https://www.shmoop.com/literature-glossary/free-indirect-discourse.html
Trigger warnings: sexual assault, violence, racism.
