J.M. Coetzee
J.M. Coetzee, in full John Maxwell Coetzee, (born February 9, 1940, Cape Town, South Africa), South African novelist, critic, and translator noted for his novels about the effects of colonization. In 2003 he won the Nobel Prize for Literature.
Foe by J.M. Coetzee
Foe is a 1986 novel by South African-born Nobel laureate J. M. Coetzee. Woven around the existing plot of Robinson Crusoe, Foe is written from the perspective of Susan Barton, a castaway who landed on the same island inhabited by "Cruso" and Friday as their adventures were already underway. Like Robinson Crusoe, it is a frame story, unfolded as Barton's narrative while in England attempting to convince the writer Daniel Foe to help transform her tale into popular fiction. Focused primarily on themes of language and power, the novel was the subject of criticism in South Africa, where it was regarded as politically irrelevant on its release. Coetzee revisited the composition of Robinson Crusoe in 2003 in his Nobel Prize acceptance speech.
Questions and Answers :-
1) How would you differential the characters of Cruso and Crusoe?
In Daniel Defoe’s novel, Robinson Crusoe, the novel portrayed as a foundational text to early fictional writings and introduced writers as well as readers to having a narrative in an island setting. Within Defoe’s novel, one is able to get a glimpse of the stereotypical gender roles from the 17thcentury because patriarchy reigned supreme. Women were property while men were authoritarians. The novel is shown through the eyes of a middle-aged white male during colonization. Crusoe “owns” the islands and instructs those living there just as if he were the “governor” or political leader-just as any British colony would be governed. By this, the reader is able to see through the eyes of Robinson Crusoe about the issues of not only gender but with race and independence. Although Robinson Crusoewas written in the early 1700’s, a more recent novel by J.M. Coetzee called Foewas an artistic piece that imitated Defoe’s well-known work. Even though the two novels share many similar aspects, Coetzee framed his work to provide an updated perspective of the story Defoe had composed by adding in the presence of a woman figure, incorporating a new setting, and more modernistic viewpoint.
2) Friday's characteristics and persona in foe and in Robinson Crusoe.
Probably the first nonwhite character to be given a realistic, individualized, and humane portrayal in the English novel, Friday has a huge literary and cultural importance. If Crusoe represents the first colonial mind in fiction, then Friday represents not just a Caribbean tribesman, but all the natives of America, Asia, and Africa who would later be oppressed in the age of European imperialism. At the moment when Crusoe teaches Friday to call him “Master” Friday becomes an enduring political symbol of racial injustice in a modern world critical of imperialist expansion. Recent rewritings of the Crusoe story, like J. M. Coetzee’s Foe and Michel Tournier’s Friday, emphasize the sad consequences of Crusoe’s failure to understand Friday and suggest how the tale might be told very differently from the native’s perspective.
3) who is protagonist ? ( Foe - Susan - Friday - Unnamed narrator)
Cruso is adapted from Robinson Crusoe, the protagonist of Daniel Defoe's famous novel. He has long moved past any semblance to Defoe's character by the time he is introduced to the narrative. Susan tries to extract information from Cruso but notes that his memories are scattered and unreliable. Any version of Defoe's Crusoe that once existed has been replaced by Cruso and his empty terraces and empty mind. Whereas Defoe's Crusoe was a younger and more sympathetic figure, Coetzee's character is older and more stubborn. He is the lonely king of his pitiful domain. Coetzee's Cruso is a beguiling character. He wages war against apes that pose no apparent threat. He is struck down by mysterious fevers. He builds terraces but can not plant any gardens. He bullies and cajoles Friday but welcomes Susan into the camp without hesitation. He shouts at Susan but agrees to make her shoes. In a fevered state, he sexually assaults Susan and never mentions it again. Susan nevertheless finds Cruso's story compelling. Even after he dies she wants to tell the story because she recognizes the lingering traces of goodness in Cruso's character. The realization that Cruso is more antagonist than protagonist makes sense of Cruso's story. Susan begins to think about Cruso not as the central character in the story but as the master of Friday; Friday is the real protagonist. Cruso may be a slave owner, a torturer, and an abuser but his scattered mind and empty deeds neuter his past villainy.
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