J. M.

Coetzee
John Maxwell J. M. Coetzee (/ktsi/, kuut-SEE;[1]
born 9 February 1940) is a South African novelist, essayist, linguist, translator and recipient of the 2003 Nobel
Prize in Literature. He relocated to Australia in 2002
and lives in Adelaide.[2] He became an Australian citizen
in 2006.[3]

United States, on the Fulbright Program in 1965. Receiving a PhD in linguistics there in 1969. His PhD
thesis was on computer stylistic analysis of the works
of Samuel Beckett and was entitled The English Fiction of Samuel Beckett: An Essay in Stylistic Analysis
(1968).[7] In 1968, he began teaching English literature
at the State University of New York at Bualo where he
stayed until 1971.[7] It was at Bualo that he began his
rst novel, Dusklands.[7] In 1971, he sought permanent
residence in the United States, which was denied, due to
his involvement in anti-Vietnam-War protests. In March
1970, he had been one of 45 faculty members who occupied the universitys Hayes Hall and were subsequently arrested for criminal trespass.[15] He then returned to South
Africa to teach English literature at the University of
Cape Town, where he was promoted Professor of General Literature in 1983 and was Distinguished Professor
of Literature between 1999 and 2001.[7] Upon retiring in
2002 and relocating to Adelaide, Australia, he was made
an honorary research fellow at the English Department of
the University of Adelaide,[16] where his partner, Dorothy
Driver,[14] is a fellow academic,[17] and served as professor on the Committee on Social Thought at the University
of Chicago until 2003.[18]

In 2013, Richard Poplak of the Daily Maverick described

Coetzee as inarguably the most celebrated and decorated
living English-language author.[4] Before receiving the
2003 Nobel Prize in Literature, Coetzee was awarded
the Jerusalem Prize, CNA Prize (thrice), the Prix Femina
tranger, The Irish Times International Fiction Prize and
the Booker Prize (twice), among other accolades.

Early life and academia

Born in Cape Town, Cape Province, Union of South

Africa, on 9 February 1940 to Afrikaner parents,[5][6]
his father, Zacharias Coetzee, was an occasional lawyer
and government employee, and his mother, Vera Coetzee (born Wehmeyer), a schoolteacher.[7][8] The family spoke English at home, but J M spoke Afrikaans
with other relatives.[7] He is descended from early Dutch
immigrants to South Africa in the 17th century,[9][10]
while his mother was a descendant of German and Polish
immigrants.[2][11]

2 Awards and recognition

Coetzee spent most of his early life in Cape Town and

in Worcester in Cape Province (modern-day Western
Cape) as recounted in his ctionalized memoir, Boyhood
(1997). The family moved to Worcester when he was
eight, after his father had lost his government job.[8]
He attended St. Josephs College, a Catholic school in
the Cape Town suburb of Rondebosch,[12] later studying
mathematics and English at the University of Cape Town
and receiving his Bachelor of Arts with Honours in English in 1960 and his Bachelor of Arts with Honours in
Mathematics in 1961.[13][14]

Coetzee has been the recipient of numerous awards

throughout his career, although he has a reputation for
avoiding award ceremonies.[19]

2.1 Booker Prizes, 1983 and 1999

He was the rst writer to be awarded the Booker Prize
twice: rst for Life & Times of Michael K in 1983, and
again for Disgrace in 1999.[20][21] Two other authors have
since managed this Peter Carey (in 1988 and 2001)
and Hilary Mantel (in 2009 and 2012).

He then relocated to the United Kingdom, in 1962,

worked as a computer programmer for IBM in London,
staying until 1965.[7] In 1963, while still in the UK, was
awarded a Master of Arts degree from the University of
Cape Town for a thesis on the novels of Ford Madox Ford
entitled The Works of Ford Madox Ford with Particular Reference to the Novels (1963).[7] His experiences in
England were later recounted in Youth (2002), his second
volume of ctionalised memoirs.

Summertime, named on the 2009 longlist,[22] was an early

favourite to win an unprecedented third Booker Prize for
Coetzee.[23][24] It subsequently made the shortlist, but lost
out to bookmakers favourite and eventual winner Wolf
Hall by Hilary Mantel.[25] Coetzee was also longlisted in
Coetzee went to the University of Texas at Austin, in the 2003 for Elizabeth Costello and in 2005 for Slow Man.[26]
1

2.2

Nobel Prize in Literature, 2003

On 2 October 2003, Horace Engdahl, head of the

Swedish Academy, announced that Coetzee had been
chosen as that years recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature, making him the fth African writer to be so
honoured[27] and the second South African after Nadine
Gordimer.[28] When awarding the prize, the Swedish
Academy stated that Coetzee in innumerable guises
portrays the surprising involvement of the outsider.[29]
The press release for the award also cited his wellcrafted composition, pregnant dialogue and analytical
brilliance, while focusing on the moral nature of his
work.[29] The prize ceremony was held in Stockholm on
10 December 2003.[28]

PHILOSOPHY

discipline and dedication. He does not drink,

smoke, or eat meat. He cycles vast distances
to keep t and spends at least an hour at his
writing-desk each morning, seven days a week.
A colleague who has worked with him for more
than a decade claims to have seen him laugh
just once. An acquaintance has attended several dinner parties where Coetzee has uttered
not a single word.[46]
Asked about this comment in an interview by email, Coetzee said, I have met Rian Malan only once in my life.
He does not know me and is not qualied to talk about
my character. [47]

As a result of his reclusive nature, signed copies of Coetzees ction are highly sought after.[48] Recognising this,
he was a key gure in the establishment of Oak Tree
2.3 Other awards and recognition
Press's First Chapter Series, limited edition signed works
A three-time winner of the CNA Prize,[30] Waiting for the by literary greats to raise money for the child victims and
Barbarians received both the James Tait Black Memo- orphans of the African HIV/AIDS crisis.[49]
rial Prize and the Georey Faber Memorial Prize,[31]
Age of Iron was awarded the Sunday Express Book
of the Year award,[32] and The Master of Petersburg
4 Personal life
was awarded The Irish Times International Fiction Prize
[26]
in 1995.
He has also won the French Prix Femina
[50]
and divorced in
tranger, the Commonwealth Writers Prize, and the He married Philippa Jubber in 1963
[8]
1987 Jerusalem Prize for the Freedom of the Individual 1980. He has a daughter, Gisela (born 1968) and a son,
Nicolas (born 1966) from this marriage.[50] Nicolas died
in Society.[31][32][33]
in 1989 at the age of 23 in an accident.[8][50][51][52][53]
Coetzee was awarded the Order of Mapungubwe (gold
class) by the South African government on 27 Septem- On 6 March 2006, Coetzee became an Australian
[16]
ber 2005 for his exceptional contribution in the eld citizen, and it has been argued that his acquired 'Aus[43]
of literature and for putting South Africa on the world tralianness is deliberately adopted and stressed.
[34]
stage. He holds honorary doctorates from The Ameri- Coetzees younger brother, the journalist David Coetzee,
can University of Paris,[35] the University of Adelaide,[36] died in 2010.[54]
La Trobe University,[37] the University of Natal,[38] the
University of Oxford,[39] Rhodes University,[40] the State
University of New York at Bualo,[32] the University of
Strathclyde,[32] the University of Technology, Sydney[41] 5 Philosophy
and the Adam Mickiewicz University in Pozna[42]
In November 2014, Coetzee was honoured with a threeday academic conference entitled JM Coetzee in the
World, held in his adopted city of Adelaide. It was described as the culmination of an enormous collaborative
eort and the rst event of its kind in Australia and a
reection of the deep esteem in which John Coetzee is
held by Australian academia.[43]

5.1 South Africa

Along with Andr Brink and Breyten Breytenbach, Coetzee was, according to Fred Pfeil, at the forefront of
the anti-apartheid movement within Afrikaner literature
and letters.[55] On accepting the Jerusalem Prize in 1987,
Coetzee spoke of the limitations of art in South African
society, whose structures had resulted in deformed and
stunted relations between human beings and a deformed and stunted inner life. He went on to say that
3 Public image
South African literature is a literature in bondage. It is a
less than fully human literature. It is exactly the kind of
Coetzee is known as reclusive and avoids publicity to such literature you would expect people to write from prison.
an extent that he did not collect either of his two Booker He called on the South African government to abandon its
Prizes in person.[44][45] South African writer Rian Malan apartheid policy.[33] Scholar Isidore Diala states that J. M.
has said that:
Coetzee, Nadine Gordimer and Andr Brink are three of
South Africas most distinguished white writers, all with
Coetzee is a man of almost monkish selfdenite anti-apartheid commitment.[56]

5.3

Law

It has been argued that Coetzees 1999 novel Disgrace allegorises South Africas Truth and Reconciliation Commission.[57] Asked about his views on the TRC, Coetzee
has stated: In a state with no ocial religion, the TRC
was somewhat anomalous: a court of a certain kind based
to a large degree on Christian teaching and on a strand of
Christian teaching accepted in their hearts by only a tiny
proportion of the citizenry. Only the future will tell what
the TRC managed to achieve.[58]
Following his Australian citizenship ceremony, Coetzee
said that I did not so much leave South Africa, a country with which I retain strong emotional ties, but come
to Australia. I came because from the time of my rst
visit in 1991, I was attracted by the free and generous
spirit of the people, by the beauty of the land itself and
when I rst saw Adelaide by the grace of the city that
I now have the honour of calling my home.[16] When
he initially moved to Australia, he had cited the South
African governments lax attitude to crime in that country as a reason for the move, leading to a spat with Thabo
Mbeki, who, speaking of Coetzees novel Disgrace stated
that South Africa is not only a place of rape.[44] In 1999,
the African National Congress submission to an investigation into racism in the media by the South African
Human Rights Commission named Disgrace as a novel
exploiting racist stereotypes.[59] However, when Coetzee
won his Nobel Prize, Mbeki congratulated him on behalf of the South African nation and indeed the continent
of Africa.[60]

3
politics, with its new economistic bent, is even
more repellent than it was fteen years ago.[58]

5.3 Law
In 2005, Coetzee criticised contemporary anti-terrorism
laws as resembling those employed by the apartheid
regime in South Africa: I used to think that the people who created [South Africas] laws that eectively suspended the rule of law were moral barbarians. Now I
know they were just pioneers ahead of their time.[62] The
main character in Coetzees 2007 Diary of a Bad Year,
which has been described as blending memoir with ction, academic criticism with novelistic narration and refusing to recognize the border that has traditionally separated political theory from ctional narrative,[63] shares
similar concerns about the policies of John Howard and
George W. Bush.[64]

5.4 Animals

In recent years, Coetzee has become a vocal critic

of animal cruelty and advocate for the animal rights
movement.[65] In a speech given on his behalf by Hugo
Weaving in Sydney on 22 February 2007, Coetzee railed
against the modern animal husbandry industry.[66] The
speech was for Voiceless, the animal protection institute,
an Australian non-prot animal protection organization,
of which he became a patron in 2004.[67] Coetzees ction
has similarly engaged with the problems of animal cruelty
5.2 Politics
and animal welfare, in particular his books Disgrace, The
Lives of Animals, Elizabeth Costello and in the short story
Coetzee has never specied any political orientation, The Old Woman and the Cats which has as its protagonist
though has alluded to politics in his work. Writing about Elizabeth Costello. He is vegetarian.[68]
his past in the third person, Coetzee states in Doubling the
Coetzee wanted to be a candidate in the 2014 European
Point that:
Parliament election for the Dutch Party for the Animals.
His candidature was however rejected by the Dutch elecPolitically, the raznochinets can go either
tion board, which argued that candidates had to prove leway. But during his student years he, this pergal residence in the European Union to be allowed.
son, this subject, my subject, steers clear of
the right. As a child in Worcester he has seen
enough of the Afrikaner right, enough of its
6 Bibliography
rant, to last him a lifetime. In fact, even before
Worcester he has perhaps seen more of cruelty
Coetzees published work consists of ction, ctionand violence than should have been allowed to
alised autobiographies (in the mode of what he terms
a child. So as a student he moves on the fringes
autrebiography),[69] criticism, translations, poetry,
of the left without being part of the left. Symscreenplays, and letters. In addition, Coetzee has pubpathetic to the human concerns of the left, he
lished critical works and translations from Dutch and
is alienated, when the crunch comes, by its lanAfrikaans.[48]
[61]
guage by all political language, in fact.
Asked about the latter part of this quote in an interview, 6.1 Novels
Coetzee said:
Dusklands (1974) ISBN 0-14-024177-9
There is no longer a left worth speaking of,
and a language of the left. The language of

In the Heart of the Country (1977) ISBN 0-14006228-9

6 BIBLIOGRAPHY
Waiting for the Barbarians (1980) ISBN 0-14006110-X
Life & Times of Michael K (1983) ISBN 0-14007448-1
Foe (1986) ISBN 0-14-009623-X
Age of Iron (1990) ISBN 0-14-027565-7
The Master of Petersburg (1994) ISBN 0-14023810-7
Disgrace (1999) ISBN 978-0-14-311528-1
Elizabeth Costello (2003) ISBN 0-670-03130-5
Slow Man (2005) ISBN 0-670-03459-2
Diary of a Bad Year (2007) ISBN 1-84655-120-X
The Childhood of Jesus (2013) ISBN 978-1-84655726-2

6.2

Short Fiction

A House in Spain Architectural Digest 57, no. 10

(2000): 68-76.
The Lives of Animals (1999) ISBN 0-691-07089-X
The African Experience Preservation 54, no. 2
(2002): 20-24.
As a Woman Grows Older (2004). In: New York
Review of Books 15 January 2004
The Nobel Lecture in Literature, 2003: He and His
Man (2004) ISBN 0-14-303453-7
The Old Woman and the Cats (2013). In:
J.M. Coetzee and Berlinde De Bruyckere:
Cripplewood/Kreupelhout ISBN 0-300-196571
Three Stories (2014) ISBN 978-1-92218-256-2.
The stories are: I. A House in Spain II. Nietverloren (rst published as The African Experience)
III. He and His Man)

6.3

Fictionalised autobiography

Boyhood: Scenes from Provincial Life (1997) ISBN

0-14-026566-X
Youth: Scenes from Provincial Life II (2002) ISBN
0-670-03102-X
Summertime (2009) ISBN 1-84655-318-0
Scenes from Provincial Life (2011) ISBN 1-84655485-3. An edited single volume of Boyhood: Scenes
from Provincial Life, Youth: Scenes from Provincial
Life II, and Summertime.

6.4 Criticism and letters

Truth in Autobiography (Cape Town: University of
Cape Town Press, 1984)
White Writing: On the Culture of Letters in South
Africa (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press,
1988) ISBN 0-300-03974-3
Doubling the Point: Essays and Interviews, ed.
David Attwell (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 1992) ISBN 0-674-21518-4
Giving Oense: Essays on Censorship (Chicago, IL:
University of Chicago Press, 1996) ISBN 0-22611176-8
Stranger Shores: Literary Essays, 19861999 (London: Secker & Warburg, 2001) ISBN 0-14-2001376
Inner Workings: Literary Essays, 20002005 (London: Harvill Secker, 2007) ISBN 0-09-950614-9
Here and Now: Letters, 2008-2011 (New York, NY:
Viking, 2013) ISBN 0-670-02666-2, a collection of
letters exchanged with Paul Auster
The Good Story: Exchanges on Truth, Fiction and
Psychotherapy, with Arabella Kurtz (New York,
NY: Viking, 2015) ISBN 978-0-525-42951-7

6.5 Translations and introductions

A Posthumous Confession by Marcellus Emants
(Boston: Twayne, 1976 & London: Quartet, 1986).
Translated and Introduced by J. M. Coetzee. ISBN
0-8057-8152-8
The Expedition to the Baobab Tree by Wilma Stockenstrm (Johannesburg: Jonathan Ball, 1983 &
London: Faber, 1984). Translated by J. M. Coetzee. ISBN 0-571-13112-3
Landscape with Rowers: Poetry from the Netherlands (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press,
2004). Translated and Introduced by J. M. Coetzee
ISBN 0-691-12385-3
Introduction to Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
(Oxford Worlds Classics) ISBN 0-19-210033-5
Introduction to Brighton Rock by Graham Greene
(Penguin Classics) ISBN 0-14-243797-2
Introduction to Dangling Man by Saul Bellow (Penguin Classics) ISBN 0-14-303987-3
Introduction to The Vivisector by Patrick White
(Penguin, 1999) ISBN 0-14-310567-1

5
Introduction to The Confusions of Young Trless by
Robert Musil (Penguin Classics, 2001) ISBN 9780-14-218000-6

Kossew, Sue (1996). Pen and Power: A PostColonial Reading of J. M. Coetzee and Andr Brink.
Amsterdam: Rodopi. ISBN 978-90-420-0094-0.

Introduction to Samuel Beckett: The Grove Centenary Edition vol. IV by Samuel Beckett, edited by
Paul Auster (New York: Grove Press, 2006) ISBN
0-8021-1820-8

Head, Dominic (1997). J. M. Coetzee. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521-48232-5.

6.6

Film and television adaptations

Dust, dir. Marion Hnsel (1985): An adaptation of

In the Heart of the Country.
The Lives of Animals, dir. Alex Harvey (2002).
De Muze/The Muse, dir. Ben van Lieshout (2007).
An adaptation of Youth: Scenes from Provincial Life
II.
Disgrace, dir. Steve Jacobs (2008).
While the above four adaptations were not written
by him, Coetzee has penned screenplays for In the
Heart of the Country and Waiting for the Barbarians. These have yet to be produced, but are published in J.M. Coetzee: Two Screenplays, ed. Hermann Wittenberg (Cape Town: University of Cape
Town Press, 2014) ISBN 978-1-77582-080-2

6.7

Collaborations

In 2012, Coetzee wrote the libretto for the opera

Slow Man by Nicholas Lens, based on his novel Slow
Man. The opera was given its world premiere on 5
July 2012 at the Malta Festival, Grand Theatre, Pozna[70][71][72][73][74][75][76][77]

Further reading
Dovey, Teresa (1988). The Novels of J.M. Coetzee:
Lacanian allegories. Johannesburg: Ad. Donker.
ISBN 0-86852-132-9.
Penner, Dick (1989). Countries of the Mind: The
Fiction of J. M. Coetzee. New York, NY: Greenwood Press. ISBN 0-313-26684-0.
Gallagher, Susan VanZanten (1991). A Story of
South Africa: J.M. Coetzees Fictions in Context.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. ISBN
0-674-83972-2.
Attwell, David (1993). J. M. Coetzee: South Africa
and the Politics of Writing. Berkeley, CA: University
of California Press. ISBN 0-520-07812-8.

Attridge, David (2004). J. M. Coetzee and the Ethics

of Reading: Literature in the Event. Chicago, IL:
University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-22603117-0.
Canepari-Labib, Michela (2005).
Old MythsModern Empires: Power, Language, and Identity in
J. M. Coetzees work. Oxford; New York, NY: Peter
Lang. ISBN 0-8204-7191-7.
Fiorella, Lucia (2006). Figure del Male nella narrativa di J.M. Coetzee. Pisa, Italy: ETS. ISBN 88-4671382-6.
Wright, Laura (2006). Writing 'out of all the camps:
J. M. Coetzees Narratives of Displacement. New
York, NY: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-97707-4.
Maso, Sawomir (2007). Pre-Versions of the
Truth: The Novels of J.M. Coetzee. Katowice: University of Silesia. ISBN 978-83-226-1721-2.
Mulhall, Stephen (2008). The Wounded Animal: J.
M. Coetzee and the Diculty of Reality in Literature
and Philosophy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press. ISBN 978-0-691-13737-7.
Poyner, Jane (2009). J. M. Coetzee and the Paradox of Postcolonial Authorship. Farnham; Burlington, VT: Ashgate. ISBN 978-0-7546-5462-9.
Clarkson, Carrol (2009). J. M. Coetzee: Countervoices. Basingstoke; New York, NY: Palgrave
Macmillan. ISBN 978-0-230-22156-7.
Nashef, Hania A.M. (2009). The Politics of Humiliation in the Novels of J. M. Coetzee. New York, NY:
Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-65260-5.
Marais, Mike (2009). Secretary of the Invisible: The
Idea of Hospitality in the Fiction of J. M. Coetzee.
Amsterdam: Rodopi. ISBN 90-420-2712-6.
Head, Dominic (2009). The Cambridge Introduction
to J.M. Coetzee. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press. ISBN 978-0-521-68709-6.
Dooley, Gillian (2010). J. M. Coetzee and the Power
of Narrative. New York: Cambria Press. ISBN 9781-60497-673-1.
van der Vlies, Andrew (2010). J.M. Coetzees 'Disgrace'. New York, NY: Continuum. ISBN 0-82640661-0.

7 FURTHER READING
Hayes, Patrick (2010). J. M. Coetzee and the Novel:
Writing and Politics After Beckett. Oxford; New
York, NY: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-019-958795-7.
Lpez, Mara J. (2011). Acts of Visitation: The Narrative of J. M. Coetzee. Amsterdam: Rodopi. ISBN
978-90-420-3407-5.
MacFarlane, Elizabeth (2013). Reading Coetzee.
Amsterdam: Rodopi. ISBN 978-90-420-3701-4.
Hallemeier, Katherine (2013). J. M. Coetzee and
the Limits of Cosmopolitanism. New York, NY: Palgrave MacMillan. ISBN 978-1-137-35254-5.

J. M. Coetzee and Ethics: Philosophical Perspectives

on Literature, eds. Anton Leist and Peter Singer
(New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2010).
A Companion to the Works of J. M. Coetzee, eds.
Tim Mehigan (Rochester: Camden House, 2011).
Strong Opinions: J. M. Coetzee and the Authority
of Contemporary ction, eds. Chris Danta, Sue
Kossew, and Julian Murphet (New York, NY: Routledge, 2011).
Approaches to Teaching Coetzees 'Disgrace' and
Other Works, eds. Laura Wright, Jane Poyner, and
Elleke Boehmer (The Modern Language Association of America, 2014).

Pawlicki, Marek (2013). Between Illusionism and

Anti-Illusionism: Self-Reexivity in the Chosen Novels of J. M. Coetzee. Newcastle Upon Tyne: 7.2 Interviews
Cambridge Scholars Publishing. ISBN 978-1-443 Speaking J. M. Coetzee, Stephen Watson, Speak
85304-0.
vol. 1, no. 3 (1978): 2124.
Zimbler, Jarad (2014). J. M. Coetzee and the Politics
An Interview with J. M. Coetzee, Tony Morphet,
of Style. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Social Dynamics vol. 10, no. 1 (1984): 62-65.
ISBN 978-1-107-04625-2.
Attwell, David (2015). J. M. Coetzee and the Life of
Writing: Face to Face with Time. New York, NY:
Viking Books. ISBN 978-0-525-42961-6.

7.1

Collected essays

The Writings of J. M. Coetzee, ed. Michael Valdez

Moses (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1994).
Critical perspectives on J. M. Coetzee, eds. Graham
Huggan and Stephen Watson (New York, NY: St.
Martins Press, 1996).
Critical Essays on J. M. Coetzee, ed. Sue Kossew
(New York, NY: G.K. Hall, 1998).
A Universe of (Hi)stories: Essays on J. M. Coetzee, ed. Liliana Sikorska (Frankfurt am Main; New
York, NY: Peter Lang, 2006).
J. M. Coetzee and the Idea of the Public Intellectual, ed. Jane Poyner (Athens, OH: Ohio University
Press, 2006).
J. M. Coetzee: Critical Perspectives, ed. Kailash C.
Baral (New Delhi: Pencraft, 2008).
J. M. Coetzee in Context and Theory, eds. Elleke
Boehmer, Katy Iddiols, and Robert Eaglestone
(London; New York, NY: Continuum, 2009).
J. M. Coetzees Austerities, eds. Graham Bradshaw
and Michael Neill (Surrey; Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2010).

An Interview with J. M. Coetzee, Jean Svry,

Commonwealth: Essays and Studies vol. 9, no. 1
(1986): 17.
Two Interviews with J. M. Coetzee, 1983 and
1987, Tony Morphet, TriQuarterly 69 (SpringSummer 1987): 45464.
On the Question of Autobiography: Interview with
J. M. Coetzee, David Attwell, Current Writing: Text
and Reception in South Africa vol. 3, no. 1 (1991):
117122.
An Interview with J. M. Coetzee, Richard Begam,
Contemporary Literature vol. 33, no. 3 (1992):
419431.
An Interview with J. M. Coetzee, World Literature
Today vol. 70, no. 1 (1996): 107110.
Voice and Trajectory: An Interview with J. M. Coetzee, Joanna Scott, Salmagundi 114/115 (1997):
82102.
The Sympathetic Imagination: A Conversation
with J. M. Coetzee, Eleanor Wachtel, Brick: A Literary Journal 56 (2001): 3747.
A Rare Interview with a Literary Giant, Michael
Shechner, Bualo News Oct. 13, 2002, page E1.
An Exclusive Interview with J. M. Coetzee, David
Attwell, Dagens Nyheter, Dec. 8, 2003
Animals, Humans, and Cruelty, Djurens Rtt,
2004

7
An Interview with J. M. Coetzee, Erik Grayson,
Stirrings Still vol. 3, no. 1 (2006): 47.
All Autobiography is Autre-biography, David
Atwell, in Selves in Question: Interviews on South
African Auto/biography, ed. Judith Ltge Coullie
et al. (Honolulu, HI: University of Hawai'i Press,
2006), 213218.
The Canadian Seal Hunt: An Interview with J. M.
Coetzee, The Humane Society of the United States,
Mar. 14, 2008
Nevertheless, My Sympathies are with the Karamazovs: An Email Correspondence: May December 2008, Arabella Kurtz, Salmagundi 166/167
(Spring 2010): 3972.

[6] Richards Cooper, Rand (2 November 1997). Portrait of

the writer as an Afrikaner. New York Times. Retrieved 9
October 2009.
[7] Head, Dominic (2009). The Cambridge Introduction to J.
M. Coetzee. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp.
12. ISBN 0-521-68709-8.
[8] Price, Jonathan (April 2012). J.M. Coetzee. Emory
University. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[9] Trying to unwrap the great Coetzee enigma. Irish
Examiner. His Cape ancestry begins as early as the
17th century with the arrival from Holland of one Dirk
Couch"

"... A Certain Age ..., Lore Watterson, Classicfeel

Dec/Jan (201213): 2229.

[10] A Nobel calling: 100 years of controversy. The Independent. 14 October 2005. Retrieved 2 August 2009.

Authorised biography

J. C. Kannemeyer, J. M. Coetzee: A Life in Writing

(Jonathan Ball, 2012). ISBN 978-1-86842-495-5

See also
List of African writers

[5] Attridge, Derek (2004). J. M. Coetzee and the Ethics of

Reading: Literature in the Event. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press. p. 94. ISBN 978-0-226-03117-0.

An Interview with J. M. Coetzee, Lawrence

Rainey, David Attwell, and Benjamin Madden,
Modernism/Modernity vol. 18, no. 4 (2011): 847
853.

7.3

[4] Donadio, Rachel (3 January 2013). Disgrace: JM Coetzee humiliates himself in Johannesburg. Or does he?".
Daily Maverick. Retrieved 3 January 2013.

References

[1] Sangster, Catherine (1 October 2009). How to Say:

JM Coetzee and other Booker authors. BBC News.
Retrieved 26 November 2012.: The rst syllable is
pronounced kuut (uu as in book); debate rages about
the pronunciation of the ee at the end. Many South
Africans, whether Afrikaans speakers or not, pronounce
this as a diphthong EE-uh, as in the word idea. Indeed, kuut-SEE-uh was the Units original recommendation in the early 1980s, based on the advice of the South
African Broadcasting Corporation and his London publisher, Secker and Warburg. However, that vowel can also
be pronounced as a monophthong (kuut-SEE), especially
by those from the south of the country, and this is the pronunciation that the author uses and prefers the BBC to use
too.
[2] Coetzee honoured in Poznan. Polskie Radio. 10 July
2012. Retrieved 12 January 2014. His maternal greatgrandfather was born in Czarnylas, Poland
[3] Donadio, Rachel (16 December 2007). Out of South
Africa. The New York Times. Retrieved 12 January
2014.

[11] Barnard, Rita (19 November 2009). Coetzee in/and

Afrikaans. Journal of Literary Studies 25 (4): 84105.
doi:10.1080/02564710903226692. Retrieved 12 January
2014.
[12] Lowry, Elizabeth (22 August 2007). J. M. Coetzees rufed mirrors. Times Literary Supplement (London). Retrieved 2009-08-02.
[13] Easton, John; Friedman, Allan; Harms, William; Koppes,
Steve; Sanders, Seth (23 September 2003). Faculty
receive DSPs, named professorships. University of
Chicago Chronicle. Retrieved 2 August 2009.
[14] John Coetzee. Whos Who of Southern Africa. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[15] A rare interview with literary giant J. M. Coetzee. Buffalo News. 13 October 2002. p. E1.
[16] JM Coetzee became an Australian citizen. Mail &
Guardian. 6 March 2006. Retrieved 31 August 2011.
[17] Professor Dorothy Driver. University of Adelaide. 12
September 2012. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[18] Richmond, Chris (2007). John M. Coetzee. In Badge,
Peter. Nobel Faces: A Gallery of Nobel Prize Winners.
Weinheim: Wiley-VCH. pp. 428429. ISBN 3-52740678-6. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[19] Lake, Ed (1 August 2009). Starry-eyed Booker Prize.
The National. Retrieved 1 August 2009.
[20] Gibbons, Fiachra (25 October 1999). Absent Coetzee
wins surprise second Booker award. The Guardian. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[21] Coetzee wins Nobel Literature Prize. Al Jazeera. 4 October 2003. Retrieved 4 October 2003.

REFERENCES

[22] Brown, Mark (28 July 2009). Heavyweights clash on

Booker longlist. The Guardian. Retrieved 12 January
2014.

[41] New honour for Nobel laureate. University of Technology, Sydney. 1 October 2008. Retrieved 12 January
2014.

[23] Flood, Alison (29 July 2009). Coetzee leads the bookies
Booker race. The Guardian. Retrieved 12 January 2014.

[42] The ceremony of awarding the title of doctor honoris

causa to professor J.M. Coetzee. Adam Mickiewicz University in Pozna. 13 July 2012. Retrieved 12 January
2014.

[24] Langley, William (4 September 2009). Man Booker

Prize: J.M Coetzee prole. Daily Telegraph. Retrieved
8 September 2009.
[25] Mantel named Booker prize winner. BBC News. 6 October 2009. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[26] J M Coetzee. Booker Prize Foundation. Retrieved 12
January 2014.
[27] Coetzee wins Nobel literature prize. BBC News. 2 October 2003. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[28] Coetzee receives Nobel honour. BBC News. 10 December 2003. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[29] The Nobel Prize in Literature: John Maxwell Coetzee.
Swedish Academy. 2 October 2003. Retrieved 2 August
2009.
[30] Banville, John (16 October 2003). Being and nothingness. The Nation. Retrieved 12 January 2014.(subscription required)
[31] O'Neil, Patrick M. (2004). Great World Writers: Twentieth Century. London: Marshall Cavendish. pp. 225244.
ISBN 0-7614-7468-4. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[32] Killam, Douglas; Kerfoot, Alicia L. (2007). Coetzee,
J(ohn) M(axwell)". Student Encyclopedia of African Literature. Westport, CT: Greenwood. pp. 9293. ISBN
0-313-33580-X. Retrieved 12 January 2014.

[43] Heaney, Claire (14 November 2014). Is JM Coetzee

an 'Australian writer'? The answer could be yes. The
Guardian. Retrieved 25 May 2015.
[44] Pienaar, Hans (3 October 2003). Brilliant yet aloof, Coetzee at last wins Nobel prize for literature. The Independent. Retrieved 1 August 2009.
[45] Smith, Sandra (7 October 2003). What to say about ...
JM Coetzee. The Guardian. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[46] Cowley, Jason (25 October 1999). The New Statesman
Prole J M Coetzee. New Statesman. Retrieved 12
January 2014.
[47] Quoted in J.C. Kannemeyer, J.M. Coetzee: A Life in Writing' (Scribe, 2012), p.583.
[48] The reclusive Nobel Prize winner: JM Coetzee. South
African Tourism. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[49] Bray, Nancy. How The First Chapter Series was born.
Booker Prize Foundation. Archived from the original on
24 February 2012. Retrieved 2 August 2009.
[50] J. M. Coetzee. The Nobel Foundation. 2003. Retrieved
1 August 2009.
[51] Gallagher, Susan (1991). A Story of South Africa: J. M.
Coetzees Fiction in Context. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press. p. 194. ISBN 0-674-83972-2.

[33] Coetzee, getting prize, denounces apartheid. New York

Times. 11 April 1987. Retrieved 2 August 2009.

[52] Scanlan, Margaret (1997). Incriminating documents:

Nechaev and Dostoevsky in J. M. Coetzees The Master
of St Petersburg". Philological Quarterly 76 (4): 463477.

[34] National Awards 27 September 2005. Republic of

South Africa. 6 December 2007. Retrieved 12 January
2014.

[53] Pearlman, Mickey (18 September 2005). J.M. Coetzee

again sheds light on the 'black gloom' of isolation. Star
Tribune. p. 14F.

[35] Commencement 2010. AUP Magazine (American University of Paris). 15 October 2010. Retrieved 17 November 2012.
[36] JM Coetzee receives honorary doctorate. University of
Adelaide. 20 December 2005. Retrieved 2 August 2009.
[37] Honorary degrees. La Trobe University. Archived from
the original on 15 September 2009. Retrieved 2 August
2009.
[38] John M. Coetzee. University of Texas at Austin. Retrieved 2 August 2009.
[39] Oxford honours arts gures. BBC News. 21 June 2002.
Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[40] SA writer honoured by Rhodes. Daily Dispatch. 12
April 1999. Archived from the original on 24 August
1999. Retrieved 2 August 2009.

[54] Whiteman, Kaye (26 March 2010). David Coetzee obituary. The Guardian. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[55] Pfeil, Fred (21 June 1986). Sexual healing. The Nation.
Retrieved 21 February 2011.(subscription required)
[56] Diala, Isidore (2002). Nadine Gordimer, J. M. Coetzee, and Andr Brink: Guilt, expiation, and the
reconciliation process in post-apartheid South Africa.
Journal of Modern Literature 25 (2): 5068 [51].
doi:10.1353/jml.2003.0004.
[57] Poyner, Jane (2000). Truth and reconciliation in
JM Coetzees Disgrace (novel)". Scrutiny2: Issues
in English Studies in Southern Africa 5 (2): 6777.
doi:10.1080/18125440008565972.
[58] Poyner, Jane, ed. (2006). J. M. Coetzee in conversation
with Jane Poyner. J. M. Coetzee and the Idea of the Public
Intellectual. Athens, OH: Ohio University Press. p. 22.
ISBN 0-8214-1687-1. Retrieved 12 January 2014.

[59] Jolly, Rosemary (2006). Going to the dogs: Humanity

in J. M. Coetzees Disgrace, The Lives of Animals, and
South Africas Truth and Reconciliation Commission. In
Poyner, Jane. J. M. Coetzee and the Idea of the Public
Intellectual. Athens, OH: Ohio University Press. p. 149.
ISBN 0-8214-1687-1. Retrieved 12 January 2014.

10 External links
Biography at nobelprize.org
Nobel Lecture at nobelprize.org
J. M. Coetzee at the Nobel Prize Internet Archive

[60] Laurence, Patrick (27 September 2007). JM Coetzee

incites an ANC egg-dance. Helen Suzman Foundation.
Retrieved 2 August 2009.

The Lives of Animals, delivered for The Tanner

Lectures on Human Values, Princeton, 1997

[61] Coetzee, J. M. (1992). Attwell, David, ed. Doubling the

Point: Essays and Interviews. Harvard University Press:
Cambridge, MA. p. 394. ISBN 0-674-21518-4. Retrieved 12 January 2014.

A Word from J. M. Coetzee, address read by Hugo

Weaving at the opening of the exhibition Voiceless:
I Feel Therefore I am, by Voiceless: The Animal
Protection Institute, Feb. 22, 2007, Sherman Galleries, Sydney, Australia

[62] Aussie laws 'like apartheid'". News24 archives. 24 October 2005. Retrieved 12 January 2014.

J. M. Coetzee at The New York Review of Books

[63] Moses, Michael Valdez (July 2008). State of discontent:

J.M. Coetzees anti-political ction. Reason. Retrieved
12 January 2014.
[64] Hope, Deborah (25 August 2007). Coetzee 'diary' targets
PM. The Australian. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[65] Coetzee, J. M. (22 February 2007). Animals can't speak
for themselves its up to us to do it. The Age. Retrieved
2 August 2009.
[66] Coetzee, J. M. (22 February 2007). Voiceless: I feel
therefore I am. Hugo Weaving at Random Scribblings.
Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[67] Who is Voiceless: John M Coetzee. Voiceless. Retrieved 12 January 2014.
[68] JM Coetzee on animal rights. Women24. Retrieved 12
January 2014.
[69] Denman Flanery, Patrick (9 September 2009). J. M. Coetzees autre-biography. The Times Literary Supplement.
Retrieved 16 September 2010.
[70] Roszak, Joanna (July 2012). And We Break Down Ourselves Bi-Weekly, Polish National Audiovisual Institute
[71] Derkaczew, Joanna (11 July 2012). "'Slow Man' - Coetzee
w operze. Jak ganie czowiek. Gazeta Wyborcza.
[72] Books Live South Africa .
[73] Willem De Vries, South Africa, Boekenbrug .
[74] Uitgeverij Cossee .
[75] JM Coetzee NL .
[76] Lepszy Poznan Publikacje .
[77] The Ordinary Man, Dorota Semenowicz (Empik) .

J. M. Coetzee at The New York Times

An academic blog about writing a dissertation on
Coetzee
J. M. Coetzee: An Inventory of His Papers at the
Harry Ransom Center
Videos
Video: J. M. Coetzee speaking at The University of
Texas, Austin
Video: J. M. Coetzee speaking at the Jaipur Literature Festival
Video: David Malouf with J.M. Coetzee, Adelaide
Writers Week/You can hear Coetzee introducing
himself at the beginning of his speech
Video: J. M. Coetzee delivering his Nobel Lecture,
He and His Man, at the Swedish Academy, Stockholm, 7 December 2003

10

11

11
11.1

TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

Text

J. M. Coetzee Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._M._Coetzee?oldid=666165960 Contributors: Tarquin, Andre Engels, Fnielsen,

Peterlin~enwiki, Fonzy, Youandme, Nixdorf, Mic, Minesweeper, Greenman, Gustavf~enwiki, ArnoLagrange, Snoyes, Den fjttrade
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