Book contents
- The Cambridge Companion to J. M. Coetzee
- The Cambridge Companion to J. M. Coetzee
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Chronology
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Part I Forms
- 1 Composition and Craft: Waiting for the Barbarians, Life & Times of Michael K
- 2 Scenes and Settings: Foe, Boyhood, Youth, Slow Man
- 3 Stories and Narration: In the Heart of the Country, The Master of Petersburg, The Childhood of Jesus
- 4 Styles: Dusklands, Age of Iron, Disgrace, The Schooldays of Jesus
- 5 Genres: Elizabeth Costello, Diary of a Bad Year, Summertime
- Part II Relations
- Part III Mediations
- Further Reading
- Index
- Series page
5 - Genres: Elizabeth Costello, Diary of a Bad Year, Summertime
from Part I - Forms
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 April 2020
- The Cambridge Companion to J. M. Coetzee
- The Cambridge Companion to J. M. Coetzee
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Chronology
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Part I Forms
- 1 Composition and Craft: Waiting for the Barbarians, Life & Times of Michael K
- 2 Scenes and Settings: Foe, Boyhood, Youth, Slow Man
- 3 Stories and Narration: In the Heart of the Country, The Master of Petersburg, The Childhood of Jesus
- 4 Styles: Dusklands, Age of Iron, Disgrace, The Schooldays of Jesus
- 5 Genres: Elizabeth Costello, Diary of a Bad Year, Summertime
- Part II Relations
- Part III Mediations
- Further Reading
- Index
- Series page
Summary
Coetzee’s interest in, and ability to exploit, the conventions and expectations of genre is evident throughout his career; this chapter focuses on three examples in which the relation between fiction and non-fiction is put in question, Elizabeth Costello, Diary of a Bad Year, and Summertime. In the case of the first of these works, the chapter examines Coetzee’s conversion of lectures into a fiction, and asks how we are to take the opinions expressed by the eponymous individual. In the case of Diary of a Bad Year, it discusses Coetzee’s framing of diary entries within a fictional narrative, and considers the degree of authorial endorsement of the resulting ‘opinions’ and the effect of the story unfolding at the foot of the page. In Summertime, the generic challenge of a memoir supposedly written after the author’s death is explored, and attention is paid to the work’s status as autobiography and as comic self-interrogation.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Cambridge Companion to J. M. Coetzee , pp. 84 - 100Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2020