Featured Reading Guide
J M Coetzee
INCLUDES A READING GUIDE After years teaching Romantic poetry at the Technical University of Cape Town, David Lurie, middle-aged and twice divorced, has an impulsive affair with a student. The affair sours; he is denounced and summoned before a committee of inquiry. Willing to admit his guilt, but refusing to yield to pressure to repent publicly, he resigns and retreats to his daughter Lucy’s isolated smallholding. For a time, his daughter’s influence and the natural rhythms of the farm promise to harmonise his discordant life. But the balance of power in the country is shifting. He and Lucy become…
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J 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.
topAbout the Book
INCLUDES A READING GUIDE After years teaching Romantic poetry at the Technical University of Cape Town, David Lurie, middle-aged and twice divorced, has an impulsive affair with a student. The affair sours; he is denounced and summoned before a committee of inquiry. Willing to admit his guilt, but refusing to yield to pressure to repent publicly, he resigns and retreats to his daughter Lucy’s isolated smallholding. For a time, his daughter’s influence and the natural rhythms of the farm promise to harmonise his discordant life. But the balance of power in the country is shifting. He and Lucy become victims of a savage and disturbing attack which brings into relief all the faultlines in their relationship.
topJ M Coetzee interview/review
topStarting Points for Discussion
- Consider the nihilistic vision supported by Lurie and every other character in Disgrace, perhaps with the exception of Lucy. Is there any hope of reconciliation between different ethnicities, sexes or even members of the same family?
- After the brutal attack, the novels themes become clear. Consider the landscape of this novel and the fact that it is still apparent in Mandela’s South Africa.
- Lurie, though fascinating, is not a sympathetic character. After the attack, his abiding concern is for his daughter. Is his love for Lucy his saving grace? And to what extent do you sympathise with her wish not to press charges against her attackers?
- ‘There must be some niche in the system for women.’ Lurie has made use of women and his own daughter is used in turn. Women are the objects of punitive violence. Discuss the unswerving pessimism in Disgrace.
- The dog imagery throughout this novel is chilling and indelible. Examine this figurative language. What does Lurie’s ambivalence towards the young, injured dog at the end of the book suggest to you?
- The Coetzeen hero lives in a world of lawlessness, where social structures are in chaos and morality and decency no longer have the same currency. In Disgrace, what moral uncertainties does Coetzee make you confront?
Other Books by J M Coetzee
Boyhood: Scenes from prov…
‘Boyhood is a deeply-felt and utterly compelling account of a South African …
Diary of a Bad Year
An eminent, aging Australian writer is invited to contribute to a book entitled…
Disgrace
A divorced, middle-aged English professor finds himself increasingly unable to…
Disgrace: Limited Centenary…
David Lurie, middle-aged and twice divorced, is a scholar fallen into disgrace…
Suggested Further Reading
- Sabbath’s Theatre ~ Philip Roth
- The House of Mr Biswas ~ VS Naipaul
- The Trial ~ Franz Kafka
- The House ~ Gun Nadine Gordimer
- Dog Heart ~ Breyten Breytenbach