Disgrace by J.M Coetzee

18 months into reading the Booker Prize winners and time to stop and reflect for a moment.  31 read, 14 still to read plus the 2012 winner – whatever that may be!  The journey has taken me to various libraries and second hand bookshops, and two titles borrowed from family/friends, and around the world to a plethora of time points in history.  Fascinating stuff, and on the whole I have formed a mostly positive opinion about the novels.  Recently, I read an interview with Alan Hollinghurst which touched on his Booker success and he spoke rather derogatorily about people who read his book purely because it had won the Booker Prize – and I agree with him to an extent, but I still remain as enthusiastic about this process as I did in the beginning.  Mainly because it has introduced to a variety of writing which I may not otherwise have read due to human nature of tending to stick to what I’m used to and comfortable with, instead of challenging myself with different genres and styles.  It has also been interesting to read novels spanning the forty-odd year lifespan of the Booker Prize and their approach to story-telling whether contemporaneous or not.  So, although I probably won’t have finished within my rough goal of two years, I won’t be far off – and thank you for reading, whether you are a regular or sporadic visitor to my blog!

And so to the 1999 winner, a return to Africa, this time South Africa, and yet another rather uncomfortable read.  This was in no way due to the writing which was impressive with good flow and pace which effectively conveyed the atmosphere and protagonist’s view of the plot, but purely due to the subject matter.  Having visited and worked in South Africa for a time, this novel captured the underlying tensions that centre mainly around the feelings of guilt and redemption/revenge that exist from the years of apartheid as it copes with ongoing transition.  The sense of resignation mixed with outrage, experienced by the protagonist, as he adjusts to the system of justice and its way of dealing with what he describes as ‘redistribution’ of possessions amongst the different groups of society. 

It was a complex novel which worked on a multitude of levels which is difficult to convey in this review, suffice to say I certainly didn’t relish the time spent with the characters or setting of the book.  The feeling of uneasiness experienced while reading and thinking about this book is testimony, I think, to the success of Coetzee’s writing about this subject. 

Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively

I’ve been thinking recently about electronic devices versus actual books as I continue to search for copies of the Bookers, and to be honest I think I would have found the whole experience less fulfilling if I had read them electronically.  For me, reading for pleasure seems to have to involve the tangible book held in my hand, turning the pages, feeling how far through the book you are, the smell (I remember at school being given the choice of an old or new copy of ‘Great Expectations’, where most of my classmates opted for the modern, I preferred the rather battered, yellow paged copy with the indescribable, but appealing smell that old books acquire.)  I may be old-fashioned, but the idea of ‘disappearing’ into another world through the display of an electronic device rather destroys the magic of the experience and I like the dependable nature of a novel that is there, regardless of whether or not you have remembered to charge your device.  Call me crazy but in addition, I am happy in the knowledge that in the midst of a world disaster/a powercut, I can always pick up a book and read.

Anyway, obviously there are arguments on either side and it’s not an either/or situation luckily, and most importantly, I suppose it doesn’t matter how you read, as long as you’re reading!  And if you’re reading, may I recommend ‘Moon Tiger’.  I found this a thought-provoking book, philosophical without being at all heavy.  It is written from the point of view of the protagonist Claudia, as she lies dying in a hospital bed and reflecting on her life, mulling over the people, places and events of her previous seventy-odd years as she contemplates writing a history of the world.  It recounts memories and then sometimes flips around and describes the exchange from the other characters’ view-point.   This is an interesting device, not only to demonstrate how people recall things differently, but highlighting how you are never fully aware of how you are perceived by others, and can only guess at their thoughts from what they say.  Furthermore, as Claudia mulls over her own mortality she dwells on how when we die we then exist only in people’s memories, their version of us being all that remains.

The novel was wide-ranging in its scope, touching on historical events and how they are portrayed and documented, drawing parallels between personal and world histories of what gets remembered and recorded and what doesn’t.  Moreover, the protagonists history is shaped by her interactions with the people in her life, which Lively depicts vividly, giving the characters depth and context.  I found the writing intellectually stimulating, conveyed in a very readable plotline.  Although, my one criticism is the inclusion of diary excerpts at the end of the book from Tom, Claudia’s great love who died in Egypt in WW2.  In my opinion, this should not have been included as it contributed little and was out of step with the rest of the novel, which was largely from her perspective. Notwithstanding this last criticism, some of the ideas raised in the course of ‘Moon Tiger’ will linger in my mind for sometime to come.

In A Free State by V.S. Naipaul

I had a bit of a dilemma with this book as when I searched the online database of one of the local libraries it turned up ‘In A Free State: The Novel’ and so I thought – great, that’s another one from the list!  However, when I read the preface written by V.S Naipaul I realised that the copy that I had obtained is not the edition that won the prize.  Apparently the 1971 winner was conceived as ‘a central novel, set in Africa, with shorter surrounding matter from other places.’ However he ‘grew to feel that the central novel was muffled and diminished by the surrounding material and (he) began to think that the novel should be published on its own’, in accordance with what his publisher had originally suggested.  Therefore I had a bit of a dilemma, I suppose if I was strictly reading the Booker prize-winning books I should have persisted in trying to find an original 1971 edition of the book, but instead I just read the copy I had.

It was rather an uncomfortable read due to the subject matter, following two English protagonists in an unspecified African country, as they travel to the safety of their compound, through the country as it progresses through tribal conflict.  The writing is vivid and conveys the vast mixture of emotions involved in such a transition of a country and its people.  It was unsettling to read how fear of the unknown future pervaded due to the upsetting of previously established hierarchy and behavioural code.  I think, as a white British person, colonialism makes me feel rather uncomfortable and yet so does the lawless violence and atrocities that are committed in the process of seizing power.  This book, although published 41 years ago, still maintains its resonance as countries in Africa still struggle with corruption of governments.  And yet, permeating the sensitive nature of the storyline and the interactions between the characters, is a huge sense of awe when faced with the vast scale of Africa and the draw it has on people that live, visit or settle there, despite all the challenges presented by geography and politics.