Joyless. Final lines: "One of these days the ambulance men will call at Ganapathy's flat & bring him out on a stretcher with a sheet over his face. When they have fetched Ganapathy they might as well come & fetch him(our hero) too."
I shudder to think what kind of vantage point of consciousness is that of the Daily Mail's critic who describes it as "exhilerating."
Whenever I decide to forego my natural inclinations & read what is generally being touted as modern great literature, my natural inclinations are proven to be the far more accurate barometer of what I enjoy. At least Coetzee's book was relatively short and those occasions when I defy what naturally attracts me incredibly few.
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7 comments:
i read his 'Waiting for the Barbarians' and felt sick. Like Sartre, he just seems to have a muddy, unheroic, painful view of life & humanity, and you take that away with you. When i was 19 i made the discovery that virtually anything touted as 'genius' that wasn't more than 50 years old would usually be shallow posturing; but that anything from before that would, 9 times out of 10, be very good.
Yeah I've read a few of Coetzee's novels and he is a bit depressing alright. Seems to like animals and Kafka though so he can't be all bad. Seriously though think he deserves more praise than some of those other Booker prize laureates - Ian McEwan, Peter Carey, even Banville and Ishiguro - and the supposed young British geniuses Zadie Smith, ali Smith etc.
There is I'd agree some substance to Coetzee & I haven't read any of those others you mention, Gearoid, & my instinct would be Coetzee of greater worth. I've erad one other of his- The Master of St Petersburg, because of its subject matter, Dostoevsky, & twas again intelligent but pretty joyless.
There is one genuine genius around from whom at his best is a joy to read & that's Victor Pelevin, whose writing I'll give an example of later. A slightly hit & miss writer but when he hits, they are extremely palpable. Try Clay Machine Gun(or alternatively given as Buddha's Little Finger), Life of Insects or short story collection, The Blue Lantern. A Werewold Problem in Central Russia a more inconsistent collection but the title story pure genius. Also, I've a feeling you'd love it for the cover alone.
Here's an interview with said genius.
avoid Ian McEwan like a lecherous chav skank on a Wednesday night in Bradford. Carey not as bad, e.g. Oscar & Lucinda is enjoyably quirky. But on the whole, the Booker Prize authors are shite. The only BP winners who i think are any good are Michael Ondaatje and Rushdie, and even they're hit & miss.
Coetzee is a joy to read. Banville is even better. If you love langauge (but despair of life) they are unsurpassed.
I used to think that about Banville Neil but now I think really it's style over substance. Besides it's always the same arrogant old-world world-weary over-educated improbably fluent narrator, deserving of a bit of comeupance, for every book. Read one in a way you've read them all (see Birchwood, Book of Evidence, The untouchable, Shroud, the Sea et al)
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