Disgrace, Desire, and Degradation: The Experience of Intrapersonal Reconciliation and Power Relations in Post Apartheid South Africa

Type :

Presentation

Pages :

6 pages

Format :

.doc

Published date :

02/19/2008

Category :

History & geography

Sub category :

Modern history

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Summary :

Introduction
Coetzee's description David Lurie's life and work
His casual attitude toward the seduction of a coloured girl
1. The social and political climate in South Africa
2. His refusal to offer a confession
3. David's words to Lucy
Lucy life and that of her father
1. Living the life she chooses
2. Her love for Helen
Lucy's rape
1. Lucy's decision to keep the child
David's return to Cape Town
Conclusion
Works cited

Abstract

J.M. Coetzee uses the third person omniscient point of view to tell the story of the unraveling of David Lurie's career and the proceeding time he spends with his daughter, Lucy, in the rural areas of the Eastern Cape of south africa. Through this point of view, Coetzee creates a voice that is distant: he evokes extreme emotion in the reader through the complexity of his characters while nevertheless remaining ostensibly veiled in an objective and unyielding tone of voice. It is through this narration that Coetzee discloses the emotional angst and uncertainty that plague both David and Lucy at different points throughout the novel. Coetzee offers a comparison of the varying degrees to which David and Lucy are disgraced and endure shame. While their emotions are precipitated by opposing forces and manifest themselves differently, thus revealing the contrast in their cognitive makeups, they both experience a disgrace that is analogous to the infamy of apartheid and undergo significant, yet muddled internal transformations that mirror the complexity of post apartheid south africa.