J.M.쿳시의 소설과 미국의 식민주의/제국주의--『어둠의 땅』의 「베트남 프로젝트」를 중심으로

왕은철 한국영어영문학회 2008 영어 영문학 Vol.54 No.1

Critics are inclined to interpret J.M. Coetzee’s novels in South African contexts, which Coetzee’s own background seems to support. One has to bear in mind, however, that Coetzee tends to “see the South African situation as only one manifestation of a wider historical situation to do with colonialism, late colonialism, neo-colonialism.” In other words, putting too much emphasis on South African contexts may diminish or undermine significance of Coetzee’s multi-layered novels. In this context, the purpose of this paper is to highlight what Coetzee has to say about American colonialism/imperialism and to emphasize importance of “postcolonial rhetoric of simultaneity” which is repeatedly shown in his fictional works. It gives a meticulous attention to and analyzes “Vietnam Project,” the first novella of Dusklands, Coetzee’s very first novel, which depicts and characterizes “what Chomsky in the context of Vietnam [War] called ‘the backroom boys.’” “The Narrative of Jacobus Coetzee,” “When a Woman Grows Older,” and Diary of a Bad Year are occasionally brought into discussion as well. This kind of study seems timely and pertinent especially when we take into account the rampant American imperialism which has devastated and almost traumatized the world. Critics are inclined to interpret J.M. Coetzee’s novels in South African contexts, which Coetzee’s own background seems to support. One has to bear in mind, however, that Coetzee tends to “see the South African situation as only one manifestation of a wider historical situation to do with colonialism, late colonialism, neo-colonialism.” In other words, putting too much emphasis on South African contexts may diminish or undermine significance of Coetzee’s multi-layered novels. In this context, the purpose of this paper is to highlight what Coetzee has to say about American colonialism/imperialism and to emphasize importance of “postcolonial rhetoric of simultaneity” which is repeatedly shown in his fictional works. It gives a meticulous attention to and analyzes “Vietnam Project,” the first novella of Dusklands, Coetzee’s very first novel, which depicts and characterizes “what Chomsky in the context of Vietnam [War] called ‘the backroom boys.’” “The Narrative of Jacobus Coetzee,” “When a Woman Grows Older,” and Diary of a Bad Year are occasionally brought into discussion as well. This kind of study seems timely and pertinent especially when we take into account the rampant American imperialism which has devastated and almost traumatized the world.

Rivaling History, Refusing Charity: Contest of Ethics and Politics in J. M. Coetzee’s Life and Times of Michael K

Peggy Cho 한국현대영미소설학회 2010 현대영미소설 Vol.17 No.3

A Booker Prize winner in 1983, J. M. Coetzee's Life and Times of Michael K has long attracted critical attention for introducing a protagonist who seemed unresponsive to the gravity of the historical situation and even lacking an awareness of himself. A seminal work in Coetzee's early fictional output, it has been at the center of a heated debate between art and history or ethics and politics. While Coetzee has often been accused of evading the question of the writer's responsibility in urgent historical times, a close examination of his works reveal that he has been acutely sensitive to the demands of history. This essay reads Life and Times of Michael K as an imaginative investigation of the very structures which produce and perpetuate injustices in history and human relations. Critics have claimed that the protagonist's passivity and tendency to withdraw from society convey a negation of history. However, the silent, negative responses of Michael K are an expression both of a fierce resistance to authority and a profound desire for individual freedom and self-determination. By choosing to remain silent and refusing to become part of the colonial project or an object of institutional charity, Michael rivals history by exposing the fundamental dishonesty in human associations. The novel is also an important work in Coetzee's oeuvre as it reveals his unique ethical sensibility to the act of fictional writing. As a writer acutely sensitive about the responsibility of the author and the authority wielded in writing about the other, Coetzee pays attention to the problem of interpreting the otherness of Michael K and makes it a key formal consideration. Michael K's refusal to supply a story for a guilt-stricken narrator is used to pass judgment on the white obsession to contain the other in the narrative act. Rather than being preoccupied with its own elusiveness, Coetzee's novel succeeds in championing the autonomy of the marginal other, both on the literal and metafictional dimensions. Thus, Life and Times of Michael K is a prime example of Coetzee's concern with the ethical act of writing and the complicity of the author in the project of subordinating the marginal figures of society.

나딘 고디머의 눈으로 본 J. M. 쿳시의 소설 『마이클 K』에 나타난 원심력과 구심력에 관하여

왕은철 ( Eun Chull Wang ) 21세기영어영문학회 2014 영어영문학21 Vol.27 No.4

Nadine Gordimer published in 2010 a collection of literary essays spanning for more than half a century, one of which was her 1984 review of J. M. Coetzee’s The Life & Times of Michael K. Interestingly enough, she added a sentence to what she had written more than two decades ago: “Postscript: J. M. Coetzee took Australian citizenship in 2006.” It is hardly a news that Coetzee left South Africa and settled down in Australia, for anybody interested in Coetzee is surely aware of it. Yet Gordimer chooses to problematize it and seems to suggest the need to reappraise Coetzee’s novel in light that he is no longer a South African author. This paper not only explores in what ways The Life & Times of Michael K is related to the author’s relocation but attempts to see Coetzee’s novel in light of two antithetical forces: the centripetal force of Coetzee’s novel trying to “take up residence in a world where a living play of feelings and ideas is possible” and the centrifugal force of South African literature in which his novels are swallowed “into a political discourse.” This paper ultimately suggests that Coetzee’s novel derives its extraordinary singularity from a tension between two contradictory forces engaged in a deadly but creative fight against each other. Yet it remains to be seen, as David Attwell suggests, whether in his adopted country Coetzee will ever “produce as rich a harvest” as he has done in his native country. It is in this respect that Gordimer’s rather harsh and ironic words will need to be taken into serious account.

J. M. 쿳시의『추락』: 인종주의 공간에서 서술되는 윤리적 딜레마의 수사학

김현아 한국중앙영어영문학회 2009 영어영문학연구 Vol.51 No.2

John Maxwell Coetzee(1940- ), one of the most influential writers of the Republic of South Africa, has attracted public attention in the world of English literature. The ethics of the Other that Coetzee’s novels coherently examine has something in common with the theories of Gayatri Spivak and Emmanuel Levinas. Spivak emphasizes ethical responsibility in the postcolonial discourse and constructs a comprehensive academic and practical sphere which includes imperial history and subaltern study beyond the European philosophical and literary tradition. Levinas, an ethicist who analyzed the structure of the ethical relations between the self and the Other, further focuses on how the egoistic self respects the Other and attempts to constitute ethical relations between them. The purpose of this thesis is to analyze the Rhetoric of Ethical Dilemma Narrated in the Racism Space in J. M. Coetzee’s Disgrace (1999). While white writers like Coetzee in South Africa are considered to be more objective concerning racial discrimination than black writers, they have collided with certain racial limitations as they are not entirely free from the cultural traditions of Europe. Furthermore, white authors’ writings like Coetzee are accused of conspiring with the white people’s segregated society concepts and their former political power. This paper deals with Disgrace that suggests the future prospect of South Africa be positive through ethical coexistence in the post-Apartheid period, when the confrontation between black and white remained unchanged and conflicts and deep wounds were still felt. To explore “re-awoken” main characters rewriting contemporary history toward a new reconciliation between white and black, this analyzes Lurie, a white professor, who is deprived of his social position due to having had a sexual intercourse with his colored female pupil, and his daughter, Lucy, who was raped by black men. Although Lurie lived apart from the reality of culture, history, and geopolitics, he challenges the old stereotype that black and white cannot coexist. This text reveals not only the violence Lurie and Lucy undergo but also the process of the exploration for “truth and reconciliation” by asking whether black and white can truly coexist and by recalling the need for ethical self-reflection for true coexistence. In the end, Lurie and Lucy are reborn as characters who rewrite the contemporary history in the post-apartheid era. In Disgrace Coetzee aims to lead his readers to reflect upon what is indispensable for a world of genuine coexistence and true reconciliation instead of simply showing them the terrible events of Lurie and Lucy’s lives.

J. M. 쿳시의 소설에 나타난 공동체의 정치학 : 인종주의와 자유주의를 넘어 Beyond Apartheid and Liberalism

이석구 한국현대영미소설학회 2002 현대영미소설 Vol.9 No.2

J. M. Coetzee is often blamed for his alleged adoption of a liberal aesthetics, which, according to critics, has caused his novel to represent "a retreat from a commitment to political solutions." The diverse accusations against Coetzee are summed up in Nadine Gordimer's criticism that Coetzee excludes "social destiny" from his work of art. This study, however, directs attention to the critique of both Afikaner regime and white liberals embedded in Waiting for the Barbarians and Age of Icon. Coetzee uses liberal whites as the protagonists of his works; however, this employment of a white liberal voice is intended as exposing the inadequacy of white liberalism as an alternative to racism. For instance, in Waiting for the Barbarians, Coetzee, through the perspective of his liberal white hero, brings to the fore the inadequacy of liberal whites as an agent of bringing forth substantial changes against the naked militancy of an imperial regime. In Age of Iron, Coetzee, through the political awakening of Mrs. Curren, exposes liberal whites' complicity in racial crimes and highlights the need for their sacrifice and negation of a white identity. For instance, Mrs. Curren, bravely abandoning the comforts of bourgeois life, puts her life in danger in protest against police violence. This call for sacrifice is what, this study asserts, distinguishes Coetzee's political stance from liberalism. As Wolfgang Palaver argues, liberalism, which "can be characterized by its rejection of sacrifice," prioritizes the inviolability of the individual over anything, including the communal good and justice. The conclusion of this study is that Coetzee's novel has a vision going beyond liberalism and towards a genuine community which the author once called "a pool in which differnces wash away."

“입증할 수 없는 것”으로부터 배우기 —쿳시의 『엘리자베스 코스텔로』

손영주 한국현대영미소설학회 2009 현대영미소설 Vol.16 No.3

Taking a cue from J. M. Coetzee's analysis of Erasmus's (non)position in the essay, “Erasmus: Madness and Rivalry,” this paper examines the question of the ethics of writing and reading in Elizabeth Costello. Coetzee's view of the limits and possibilities of the Erasmian (non)position -- meaning “off the stage of political rivalry” in the era of political turmoil -- sheds much light on the writer-protagonist Elizabeth Costello's position in the novel, as well as that of Coetzee's own in postcolonial discourses. As a writer who is notoriously elusive or silent on political matters, Coetzee has frequently been accused of political and/or moral irresponsibility. On the other hand, other critics have focused on Coetzee's postmodern metafictional writing from a different perspective, arguing that Coetzee's formal experimentalism enacts an ethics which is not assumed to be secondary to politics, but initiative of alternative politics. Drawing on recent studies in relation to ethics, particularly those about the ethics of postmodern theories, these critics emphasize that Coetzee's texts reveal the unknowability of the Other, the unbridgeable gap between self and Other, language and body, and text and world, namely, the limit of representation. Few critics, however, have noted the fact that Elizabeth Costello directs the reader's attention to the 'stages' that constantly seek to make Elizabeth's statements part of the discourses of power, and thus, deliberately foregrounds the ways in which the unsympathetic and overly rational audience simplify, misunderstand, and/or distort her language about literature, ethics, and being. Elizabeth's lectures at times sound absurd, passionate, or simply crazy, and yet, the seemingly common sensical and logical accusations against her turn out to be even more problematic in their failure to read Elizabeth's “unverifiable” yet true messages: alternative knowledge and experiences that affirm “knowing” and “being” the Other. Far from endowing Elizabeth with the authority to deliver and teach truth and ethics, the text suggests that the ethics of writing would not be possible without the existence of a reader who is willing to “listen” to the “unverifiable” through an on-going process of learning how to read. Taking a cue from J. M. Coetzee's analysis of Erasmus's (non)position in the essay, “Erasmus: Madness and Rivalry,” this paper examines the question of the ethics of writing and reading in Elizabeth Costello. Coetzee's view of the limits and possibilities of the Erasmian (non)position -- meaning “off the stage of political rivalry” in the era of political turmoil -- sheds much light on the writer-protagonist Elizabeth Costello's position in the novel, as well as that of Coetzee's own in postcolonial discourses. As a writer who is notoriously elusive or silent on political matters, Coetzee has frequently been accused of political and/or moral irresponsibility. On the other hand, other critics have focused on Coetzee's postmodern metafictional writing from a different perspective, arguing that Coetzee's formal experimentalism enacts an ethics which is not assumed to be secondary to politics, but initiative of alternative politics. Drawing on recent studies in relation to ethics, particularly those about the ethics of postmodern theories, these critics emphasize that Coetzee's texts reveal the unknowability of the Other, the unbridgeable gap between self and Other, language and body, and text and world, namely, the limit of representation. Few critics, however, have noted the fact that Elizabeth Costello directs the reader's attention to the 'stages' that constantly seek to make Elizabeth's statements part of the discourses of power, and thus, deliberately foregrounds the ways in which the unsympathetic and overly rational audience simplify, misunderstand, and/or distort her language about literature, ethics, and being. Elizabeth's lectures at times sound absurd, passionate, or simply crazy, and yet, the seemingly common sensical and logical accusations against her turn out to be even more problematic in their failure to read Elizabeth's “unverifiable” yet true messages: alternative knowledge and experiences that affirm “knowing” and “being” the Other. Far from endowing Elizabeth with the authority to deliver and teach truth and ethics, the text suggests that the ethics of writing would not be possible without the existence of a reader who is willing to “listen” to the “unverifiable” through an on-going process of learning how to read.

타자를 환대하기-쿳시의 ``글쓰기``

전소영 ( So Young Jeon ) 한국현대영미소설학회 2012 현대영미소설 Vol.19 No.2

One of the most prominent characteristics of J.M. Coetzee`s novels is that there are many characters who perform the writing act in the novels like J.M. Coetzee himsel. These characters are both same and different with the real author. As a kind of spokesperson, sometimes they represent the opinion of J.M. Coetzee and sometimes show differences with it. In this kind of confessional way of writing, J.M. Coetzee represented his own limit as a white writer in South Africa with the help of these characters. Especially, Slow Man is the novel about failure of an author to transform her raw writing materials in his imagination into a real work of fiction. While Coetzee`s concern with hospitality is evident from his earlier novels in his extensive use, he expands the concept of hospitality into authorship more specifically in Slow Man. According to Derrida, unconditional hospitality is distinguished by responsiveness to otherness and denotes receiving difference of others "before any determination, before any anticipation, before any identification." Likewise, an author should open up to visit of character involuntarily as inspiration comes to her. In terms of the metaphor of hospitality, a writer could be described as both a host and a hostage to an unknown character and unknowable readers of the future. Eventually, Elizabeth Costello who is writing a novel as both a character and an author in Slow Man is representation of J.M. Coetzee himself.

Rivaling History, Refusing Charity: Contest of Ethics and Politics in J. M. Coetzee`s Life and Times of Michael K

( Peggy C. Cho ) 한국현대영미소설학회 2010 현대영미소설 Vol.17 No.3

A Booker Prize winner in 1983, J. M. Coetzee`s Life and Times of Michael K has long attracted critical attention for introducing a protagonist who seemed unresponsive to the gravity of the historical situation and even lacking an awareness of himself. A seminal work in Coetzee`s early fictional output, it has been at the center of a heated debate between art and history or ethics and politics. While Coetzee has often been accused of evading the question of the writer`s responsibility in urgent historical times, a close examination of his works reveal that he has been acutely sensitive to the demands of history. This essay reads Life and Times of Michael K as an imaginative investigation of the very structures which produce and perpetuate injustices in history and human relations. Critics have claimed that the protagonist`s passivity and tendency to withdraw from society convey a negation of history. However, the silent, negative responses of Michael K are an expression both of a fierce resistance to authority and a profound desire for individual freedom and self-determination. By choosing to remain silent and refusing to become part of the colonial project or an object of institutional charity, Michael rivals history by exposing the fundamental dishonesty in human associations. The novel is also an important work in Coetzee`s oeuvre as it reveals his unique ethical sensibility to the act of fictional writing. As a writer acutely sensitive about the responsibility of the author and the authority wielded in writing about the other, Coetzee pays attention to the problem of interpreting the otherness of Michael K and makes it a key formal consideration. Michael K`s refusal to supply a story for a guilt-stricken narrator is used to pass judgment on the white obsession to contain the other in the narrative act. Rather than being preoccupied with its own elusiveness, Coetzee`s novel succeeds in championing the autonomy of the marginal other, both on the literal and metafictional dimensions. Thus, Life and Times of Michael K is a prime example of Coetzee`s concern with the ethical act of writing and the complicity of the author in the project of subordinating the marginal figures of society.

자서전에서 ‘진실 말하기’의 문제: J. M. 쿳시의 『청년시절』 읽기

유영현 한국영어영문학회 2020 영어 영문학 Vol.66 No.2

This essay examines J. M. Coetzee’s question of truth-telling in his autobiographical writing. Analyzing mainly the writer’s second memoir Youth(2002), this study focuses on the issue of authorial sincerity in telling a confessional truth since the author’s self-reflection over his own truthfulness makes a leitmotif of this memoir. Despite some debates among critics about the fictionality of the memoir, what definitely guarantees from this text a faithful account of the writer’s memories is the narrator’s supposed sincere feeling towards truth-telling that underpins its confessional voice. Particularly paying attention to Coetzee’s careful revision of literary conventions in autobiography, we see that the writer’s efforts to explicate the real purpose of finding and telling a truth about his London life in the 1960s are deeply concerned with the narrator’s meta-autobiographical position. Then, what matters is that although Coetzee’s self-critique with his “countervoices” tries to disclose a ‘self-interest’ in remembering and organizing the past memories, there exists a skeptical point of view with respect to the truthfulness of the narrator’s truth-telling. This is a kind of epistemological dilemma that would be unavoidable in any self-conscious conception of confessional truth in one’s autobiography. Therefore, in order to overcome the limitation of self-doubt and self-referential paradox in autobiographical writing, Coetzee suggests alternatively an ethical approach for the intersubjective truth in confession in which mutual “trust” and “grace” are entrusted with the sincerity of the confessor.

공감의 취향: 쿳시의 동물소설에 나타난 소수성과 타자성에 관하여

유영현(Young-Hyeon Ryu) 한국비평이론학회 2021 비평과이론 Vol.26 No.3

본 논문은 쿳시의 동물 관련 소설 『동물들의 삶』(The Lives of Animals, 1999)과 『추락』(Disgrace, 1999)을 함께 읽고 공감적 상상력이 갖는 윤리적인 함의를 논한다. 본 논문에서 필자는 쿳시가 거론하는 채식주의와 같은 소수자의 취향이 현대인들의 동물에 대한 무관심과 무분별한 육식에 대한 일정한 비판적 관점을 담고 있다고 주장한다. 그런 면에서 두 소설에 나타난 주인공들의 동물에 대한 연민의 감정과 공감적 상상력에 대한 윤리적 접근은 “자기의 영혼을 구하고자 하는” 동기와 관련되어 사적이지만 또한 동물 타자에 대한 사회적 인식의 환기라는 점에서 실천적 의미를 지닌다. 궁극적으로 쿳시에게 공감의 윤리란 그 공감적 상상력의 확장을 뜻하는바, 한 개인의 주관성이 어떻게 상호주관성의 영역으로 나아갈 수 있는지에 달려 있다고 하겠다. 그리고 이러한 이행에서 중요한 역할을 하는 것이 바로 상상력임을 확인한다. 결론적으로, 취향의 논의가 내포하는 상호주관성의 원리는 많은 부분 공감의 상호주관성의 그것과 겹친다고 볼 수 있다. This essay aims to examine the ethical meanings of the sympathetic imagination by reading together J. M. Coetzee’s two animal-related novels, The Lives of Animals (1999) and Disgrace (1999). My research argues that the taste of minorities, such as vegetarianism, discussed by Coetzee contains a certain critical view of modern people’s indifference to animals and reckless eating of meat. In that respect, the main characters’ compassion for animals and the ethical approach to the sympathetic imagination in the two novels not only have a certain private dimension in that they start from the motive of “saving one’s soul,” but also function as a social practice for their reminder of serious awareness of nonhuman animals as our ethical “others.” Ultimately, for Coetzee, the ethics of sympathy means the expansion of the sympathetic imagination, and it will depend on how an individual’s subjectivity can advance into the realm of ‘inter-subjectivity.’ And we confirm that it is the imagination that plays an important role in this transition. In conclusion, we can say that the principle of inter-subjectivity implied in the discussion of taste overlaps that of the inter-subjectivity of sympathy in many parts.