Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee

Call this my penance. I needed to atone for two very average best sellers; I needed to remember what great writing is, what emotions a powerful narrative can affect, how a great writer can manipulate language. I didn't set out to read Disgrace, but when I stumbled across it, it seemed a perfect fit.

Coetzee's gifted writing is, as always, undeniable. In that respect, this novel served its purpose. The message, though, is so bleak, so without redemption, that I found myself dreading even developing this post. This is not a story I want to revisit.

Let it suffice to say that in Coetzee's post-apartheid South Africa, the sins of the past are inescapable. Future generations are left without even a proper language to create a narrative of their own. For this reason, and for so many others, they are as seemingly powerless against nature as the dogs Bev Shaw ushers out of this world.

I do not wish to examine David Lurie, his lurid relationship with Melanie, or the desperate situation of his daughter Lucy. As the mother of a young child, I cannot bear the thought that I could one day lack the ability to offer my son any solace or comfort, as David does. I cannot bear the thought that I might one day have to watch from the sidelines as my son exists in sorrow and fear, in an emotionally and physically dangerous situation like Lucy's. I do not wish to think about not being able to protect him.

I finished Disgrace, relieved to close the back cover, as the plane thudded onto the runway in Providence, Rhode Island. Across the aisle, a father protectively snuggled his young son, just two months older than my Nicholas. The boy stirred, turned to face Dad, closed his eyes once more. The father kissed the boys head, just barely parting his hair, now damp with sweat. I know the warmth, the slight clamminess, that met those lips. A gentle reminder that I believe in the future, in the promise of my child, and in the hope that he will exist in a better, more mindful society.

*I wrote this on a plane, 1 day before the earthquake in Haiti. Thinking of the tragedy in Port-au-Prince, I just can't shake the thought that the Haitian people have endured far, far more than their share of hardship and loss. I cannot imagine the grief and fear and discomfort being experienced. I think of parents, mothers trying to care for their children without water, without shelter. I think of parents searching for their children ... my heart breaks for them over and over again.

In light of this, my aversion to Coetzee's narrative seems extremely sheltered. My resentment for the discomfort I experienced reading it seems self-centered. I know nothing of tragedy, nothing of what the Haitians are experiencing, nothing of what has been experienced for generations in South Africa. After enduring so much, I can only imagine it would be intensely difficult to maintain any degree of optimism. I can only imagine, because I know nothing of it.

One of the commentaries on the cover of Disgrace calls it "an uncomfortable but necessary book." Now, I agree.