J M Koetzee - Disgrace

Review by Malcolm Martland October 2008
Hi I read JM Koetzee's Disgrace a few years ago. Here's my radio reviewJ M Coetzee's work includes Waiting For The Barbarians, Life & Times of Michael K, Boyhood: Scenes From Provincial Life, Youth, Elizabeth Costello, Slow Man and, most recently, Diary of A Bad Year. He was the first author to win the Booker Prize twice and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2003.1999 winner DISGRACE: Set in post apartheid south africa white professor David Lurie, twice-divorced and dissatisfied with his job as a professor of Communication, teaching one specialized class in Romantic literature at a technical university in Cape Town is "disgraced" when he seduces one of his students and is dismissed from his teaching position. He takes refuge on his unmarried daughter's farm in the Eastern Cape. For a time, they get on well although it is hard work. Lucy, the daughter also gets on well with her coloured neighbours and her father initially proposes that a neighbouring smallholder should help manage his daughters land but instead they attack the farm rape his daughter – she becomes pregnant – and he too is beaten up. He finds consolation in working at an animal clinic – where he has an affair with the vet – and he finds solace in his friendship with the dogs – many of which are destined to be put down and sent to the incinerator. It’s well written- but a bleak read – not for the depressive or faint hearted.