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Foe
With the same electrical intensity of language and insight that he brought to Waiting for the Barbarians, J.M. Coetzee reinvents the story of Robinson Crusoe—and in so doing, directs our attention to the seduction and tyranny of storytelling itself
In 1720 the eminent man of letters Daniel Foe is approached by Susan Barton, lately a castaway on a desert island. She wants him to tell her story, and that of the enigmatic man who has become her rescuer, companion, master and sometimes lover: Cruso. Cruso is dead, and his manservant, Friday, is incapable of speech. As she tries to relate the truth about him, the ambitious Barton cannot help turning Cruso into her invention. For as narrated by Foe—as by Coetzee himself—the stories we thought we knew acquire depths that are at once treacherous, elegant, and unexpectedly moving.
156 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1986
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7661 people want to read
About the author
J.M. Coetzee
185 books5,303 followersJ. M. Coetzee is a South African writer, essayist, and translator, widely regarded as one of the most influential authors of contemporary literature. His works, often characterized by their austere prose and profound moral and philosophical depth, explore themes of colonialism, identity, power, and human suffering. Born and raised in South Africa, he later became an Australian citizen and has lived in Adelaide since 2002.
Coetzee’s breakthrough novel, Waiting for the Barbarians (1980), established him as a major literary voice, while Life & Times of Michael K (1983) won him the first of his two Booker Prizes. His best-known work, Disgrace (1999), a stark and unsettling examination of post-apartheid South Africa, secured his second Booker Prize, making him the first author to win the award twice. His other notable novels include Foe, Age of Iron, The Master of Petersburg, Elizabeth Costello, and The Childhood of Jesus, many of which incorporate allegorical and metafictional elements.
Beyond fiction, Coetzee has written numerous essays and literary critiques, contributing significantly to discussions on literature, ethics, and history. His autobiographical trilogy—Boyhood, Youth, and Summertime—blends memoir with fiction, offering a fragmented yet insightful reflection on his own life. His literary achievements were recognized with the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2003.
A deeply private individual, Coetzee avoids public life and rarely gives interviews, preferring to let his work speak for itself.
Coetzee’s breakthrough novel, Waiting for the Barbarians (1980), established him as a major literary voice, while Life & Times of Michael K (1983) won him the first of his two Booker Prizes. His best-known work, Disgrace (1999), a stark and unsettling examination of post-apartheid South Africa, secured his second Booker Prize, making him the first author to win the award twice. His other notable novels include Foe, Age of Iron, The Master of Petersburg, Elizabeth Costello, and The Childhood of Jesus, many of which incorporate allegorical and metafictional elements.
Beyond fiction, Coetzee has written numerous essays and literary critiques, contributing significantly to discussions on literature, ethics, and history. His autobiographical trilogy—Boyhood, Youth, and Summertime—blends memoir with fiction, offering a fragmented yet insightful reflection on his own life. His literary achievements were recognized with the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2003.
A deeply private individual, Coetzee avoids public life and rarely gives interviews, preferring to let his work speak for itself.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,019 reviews
May 9, 2024
„Vai, poveștile mele par să aibă mai multe înțelesuri decît am intenționat” (p.88).
În Foe, Coetzee rescrie, firește, mitul lui Robinson Crusoe. Au mai făcut-o înaintea lui și alții, cel mai cunoscut este Michel Tournier.
Personajul care eșuează pe insula pustie (și nu prea) este o femeie de ispravă, Susan Barton. Ea întîlnește aici doi locuitori mai vechi, pe un anume Cruso, ins taciturn și scîrbit de viață, și pe un anume Vineri, un fost sclav cu limba tăiată. Vineri va rămîne „lacuna” de nerezolvat din trama cărții. Nici Cruso și nici Vineri nu prea seamănă cu personajele din romanul lui Daniel Defoe. Muncesc fără chef, disprețuiesc igiena, nu visează la un trai mai bun. Cruso nu mai are chef să părăsească insula. S-a obișnuit cu singurătatea. Nu așteaptă nimic bun. Vineri pare indiferent. Cînd insula e abordată de vaporul salvator, peste un an, doar Susan se bucură. Cruso moare pe vas, Susan Barton și Vineri ajung la Londra.
Femeia are, așadar, o poveste de spus, dar nu se pricepe la scris. În consecință, ia legătura cu un anume domn Foe, prozator urmărit insistent de creditori (ca Balzac). Și abia aici începe cu adevărat romanul. Susan își povestește întîmplarea în lungi scrisori, dar Foe nu dă nici un semn. Stă ascuns de „aprozi” (traduce Irina Horea), de portărei sau creditori, aș corecta eu.
Cînd, într-un final, se reîntîlnesc, prozatorul vrea să-i modifice povestea, să o facă mai palpitantă. Susan își revendică dreptul la adevărul personal și la vocea-i proprie. Nu acceptă nici una dintre sugestiile lui Foe. Discuția care urmează, cam întortocheată, privește chestiuni literare: puterea limbajului, faptul de a fi privat de limbaj (ca Vineri). În fond, are voie scriitorul să pună de la el, să înflorească lucrurile, sau e constrîns să respecte strict relatarea „autorului propriu-zis”, a martorului principal? Martorul își vrea povestea neștirbită. Nici Susan nu-l convinge pe Foe, nici Foe pe Susan. Rămîne să se înțeleagă cîndva. În final, Susan alege să trăiască împreună cu gentilul domn Foe. Dacă n-au murit, probabil că vorbesc în contradictoriu și azi.
Sfîrșitul oniric al romanului m-a lăsat cu ochii în soare.
Susan Barton către Daniel Foe: „La un moment dat, ai propus să umpli mijocul [povestirii mele] născocind canibali și pirați. Lucru cu care nu sînt de acord, pentru că nu e adevărat. Acum vii și zici că reduci insula la un episod în istoria unei femei care își caută fiica pierdută. Nici cu asta nu sînt de acord” (p.133).
March 22, 2024
COMMUNICATION WITH A FELLOW READER
(ABOUT NOTES IN THE MARGIN):
Footprints in the Sand of Time:
Hello. You don't know me. I bought your book online. I don't know your name. I don't even know whether you're dead or alive. You made notations in the margin. I noticed them straight away: some were in pencil, some, later, when I looked, were in pen, although they might have been made by someone else. We started to note similar things and make similar comments. After a while, I started to make fewer comments, because I was content with yours. Either that, or I started to think like you, to walk in your footsteps. I'm a reader like you. You're a reader like me. Reader. Like me. Please. Whoever you are. I don't think there are many of us around. Let me know if you get this message. In the meantime, I'll try to write a review. I hope it's an OK one. I hope we like it.
CRITIQUE (NOTES FROM THE MARGIN):
Friend or Foe?
"Foe" raises fascinating metafictional ideas in a text that is just as economical (157 pages) as it is intellectually and aesthetically stimulating.
It's a postmodern reconstruction of "Robinson Crusoe" that asks questions about empire and colonialism, slavery and dominion, history and fictional narrative, especially its ownership: What is the story about? Whose story or perspective is it? Who is telling the story? Who owns the story that results?
Plantation and Quotation Marks
Coetzee tells his tale in four parts.
The first is wholly contained in quotation marks. It purports to be the perspective of Susan Barton, incidentally a character from a subsequent Daniel Defoe novel ("Roxana"), who in "Foe" ends up on the island with Cruso (sic) and Friday (whose tongue has been cut out by slavers).
The second is largely epistolary, being the letters written by Susan Barton to Foe, trying to get him to write her story for publication. Again, this section is in quotation marks.
The third is an almost Borgesian confrontation between Susan and Foe, which begins, "The staircase was dark and mean." There are no quotation marks around the section.
History and Heritage
The fourth begins with the words, "The staircase is dark and mean." It mimics the beginning of the previous section (but in present tense), there are no quotation marks, however, it's not clear whether the narrator is actually Susan Barton or whether the "author" of this section is the same author as any or all of the previous sections.
It's quite possible that this author is a contemporary writer or reader (i.e., us) who is visiting Defoe's home (complete with heritage plaque). It's as if the narrator is a visitor to the home, narrating their experience in the physical space, as well as their imaginary extrapolation of events that could have taken place here three centuries before.
Dying to Tell the Tale
The bulk of the first three sections explores the power relationship between Cruso and Susan.
Eventually, it becomes clear that she will have to tell (or commission the telling) of his and/or their story. The second option necessitates the involvement of Foe, who de-authenticises the tale, in order to make it more entertaining and commercially successful.
Not only does this dialectic raise issues about control and ownership of the narrative, it dramatises a power struggle between two genders.
Friday on My Mind
Just as Susan recognises her own need and desire to communicate, increasingly, her own perspective comes to focus on the plight of Friday:
"...this is not a place of words…This is a place where bodies are their own signs. It is the home of Friday."
He has no tongue, therefore he cannot speak. He knows little English, and presumably cannot write. Therefore, apparently, he has no capacity to contribute his version of the story, in other words, a black version of history.
Susan starts to teach Friday how to write in the third section.
As if the issues raised in section four aren't enough, I wondered whether Friday might have "written" the entire novel.
Thus, there is a sense in which the book can be read as a post-colonial work that gives voice not just to non-whites, but simultaneously to women. In any event, just as it subverts the authorial conventions of literature, it subverts the social conventions of white male authoritarianism.
Friday, I'm in Love!
This review might make the novel sound very academic. The truth, however, is that it's exquisitely written. Not one word is surplus or out of place. It consumes our imagination so effectively that we don't need any distraction. However, having achieved its goal, it remains a distraction for the reader. I'm sure the previous reader would agree with me!
Date of Review: January 12, 2016
SOUNDTRACK:
"It is not whoring to entertain other people's stories and return them to the world better dressed." [J.M. Coetzee]
(ABOUT NOTES IN THE MARGIN):
Footprints in the Sand of Time:
Hello. You don't know me. I bought your book online. I don't know your name. I don't even know whether you're dead or alive. You made notations in the margin. I noticed them straight away: some were in pencil, some, later, when I looked, were in pen, although they might have been made by someone else. We started to note similar things and make similar comments. After a while, I started to make fewer comments, because I was content with yours. Either that, or I started to think like you, to walk in your footsteps. I'm a reader like you. You're a reader like me. Reader. Like me. Please. Whoever you are. I don't think there are many of us around. Let me know if you get this message. In the meantime, I'll try to write a review. I hope it's an OK one. I hope we like it.
CRITIQUE (NOTES FROM THE MARGIN):
Friend or Foe?
"Foe" raises fascinating metafictional ideas in a text that is just as economical (157 pages) as it is intellectually and aesthetically stimulating.
It's a postmodern reconstruction of "Robinson Crusoe" that asks questions about empire and colonialism, slavery and dominion, history and fictional narrative, especially its ownership: What is the story about? Whose story or perspective is it? Who is telling the story? Who owns the story that results?
Plantation and Quotation Marks
Coetzee tells his tale in four parts.
The first is wholly contained in quotation marks. It purports to be the perspective of Susan Barton, incidentally a character from a subsequent Daniel Defoe novel ("Roxana"), who in "Foe" ends up on the island with Cruso (sic) and Friday (whose tongue has been cut out by slavers).
The second is largely epistolary, being the letters written by Susan Barton to Foe, trying to get him to write her story for publication. Again, this section is in quotation marks.
The third is an almost Borgesian confrontation between Susan and Foe, which begins, "The staircase was dark and mean." There are no quotation marks around the section.
History and Heritage
The fourth begins with the words, "The staircase is dark and mean." It mimics the beginning of the previous section (but in present tense), there are no quotation marks, however, it's not clear whether the narrator is actually Susan Barton or whether the "author" of this section is the same author as any or all of the previous sections.
It's quite possible that this author is a contemporary writer or reader (i.e., us) who is visiting Defoe's home (complete with heritage plaque). It's as if the narrator is a visitor to the home, narrating their experience in the physical space, as well as their imaginary extrapolation of events that could have taken place here three centuries before.
Dying to Tell the Tale
The bulk of the first three sections explores the power relationship between Cruso and Susan.
Eventually, it becomes clear that she will have to tell (or commission the telling) of his and/or their story. The second option necessitates the involvement of Foe, who de-authenticises the tale, in order to make it more entertaining and commercially successful.
Not only does this dialectic raise issues about control and ownership of the narrative, it dramatises a power struggle between two genders.
Friday on My Mind
Just as Susan recognises her own need and desire to communicate, increasingly, her own perspective comes to focus on the plight of Friday:
"...this is not a place of words…This is a place where bodies are their own signs. It is the home of Friday."
He has no tongue, therefore he cannot speak. He knows little English, and presumably cannot write. Therefore, apparently, he has no capacity to contribute his version of the story, in other words, a black version of history.
Susan starts to teach Friday how to write in the third section.
As if the issues raised in section four aren't enough, I wondered whether Friday might have "written" the entire novel.
Thus, there is a sense in which the book can be read as a post-colonial work that gives voice not just to non-whites, but simultaneously to women. In any event, just as it subverts the authorial conventions of literature, it subverts the social conventions of white male authoritarianism.
Friday, I'm in Love!
This review might make the novel sound very academic. The truth, however, is that it's exquisitely written. Not one word is surplus or out of place. It consumes our imagination so effectively that we don't need any distraction. However, having achieved its goal, it remains a distraction for the reader. I'm sure the previous reader would agree with me!
Date of Review: January 12, 2016
SOUNDTRACK:
"It is not whoring to entertain other people's stories and return them to the world better dressed." [J.M. Coetzee]
November 2, 2020
People are extraneous, people are absent... Maestro Coetzee is complicated & this short novella is one of his earlier best... except for the ingloriously vapid ending. Hated it! But all the questions posed by J.M. Coetzee, mainly about fiction vs. Biography, & existential conundrums that arise, create a maudlin cloud... the pathos the reader deserves & also craves.
November 17, 2022
It seems a lifetime ago that I read Robinson Crusoe and I can hardly remember anything from it other than knowing it's obvious storyline of a guy being marooned on an island. I wondered whether or not it would make any difference in regards to reading Foe. In the end it didn't really matter, as I found this messy re-working not that special anyway. Of the four Coetzee novels I've now read, Foe I found to be the weakest. It's a clever idea, giving the classic a deconstructionist turn by adding new characters and including the original author himself, with his disputed reactions and shrewd wisdom, and it's written well enough, but when compared to his extraordinarily convincing novels Waiting for the Barbarians & disgrace then Foe just isn't on the same island, more like stuck on a reef.
The young castaway widow Susan Barton is really central to this parable tale, and not Cruso (Coetzee omits the e from his name), who is an irascible, lazy, imperious man who has little interest in actually trying to escape from the island, with poor old Friday just moping at his side without the ability to talk seeing as he has no tongue, which could be viewed as a social emblem for black South Africans, seeing as Coetzee has used allegorical political material before. After rescue, Cruso snuffs it, and back in England, the main focus is of Susan and Friday's travels and then Foe, and her efforts to persuade him to turn her account of life on the island into an adventure book. He on the other hand is far more interested in Susan's two years spent in Bahia, which was a time of indifference to her. This side-story, then sort of becomes the main story, when the supposed daughter of Susan shows up out of nowhere, and yet she has no recollection of her. But she does in fact have a missing daughter who was abducted and conveyed to the New World. She went looking for her in Brazil before taking a ship to Lisbon and becoming the captain's lover before the sailors mutiny wreaks havoc. I found there to be too much going on in the last third of the novel, like it's pulling in all sorts of directions not knowing where it wants to go. I didn't think much of its ambiguous ending either. I did though like Susan Barton, in the fact that she took on the responsibility of trying to find a safe passage home for Friday, who was completely lost at sea wandering around southern England with her. She could have quite easily just left him in a ditch somewhere. Still, would probably have been better off reading Defoe's classic - that will always stand the test of time, whereas this won't
December 10, 2016
"We must make Friday's silence speak, as well as the silence surrounding Friday."
Daniel Defoe /Daniel Foe's novel Robinson Crusoe was Coetzee's childhood favorite novel. At first, he had thought it was a memoir of the title character. In fact, Foe published the book as an account of a real castaway. The realization that the character was fictional, this intermixing of real and fictional, had a huge impact on him. Besides this novel, Coetzee also visited the Robinson Crusoe in the short story he read as Nobel prize acceptance speech, 'He and His Man'. The theme of which can be summed up in the following quote (from 'Foe'):
"Cruso rescued will be a deep disappointment to the world; the idea of a Cruso on his island is a better thing than the true Cruso tight-lipped and sullen in an alien England."
That is the case here as well. Besides being an adventure novel, Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (I haven't read the book) is a symbol of British Nationalism in its worst form "He is the true prototype of the British colonist. ... The whole Anglo-Saxon spirit in Crusoe: the manly independence, the unconscious cruelty, the persistence, the slow yet efficient intelligence, the sexual apathy, the calculating taciturnity." (James Joyce)
Of course, the ideal of an intellectual living an isolated life in Britain with no or little experience of sea and seamen is going to be nowhere near the actual people who might be cast away. The Crusoe as Coetzee presented him is not adventurous, not at all persistent in his effort to escape, doesn't try to start a civilisation, had no offers from cannibals for him to refuse and thus prove his nationalism, didn't rescue Friday, rather bought him, was pretty happy in living on an island and doesn't make half as good a story.
However, the book is far more than a retelling - we have only talked one-third of the book. The book later goes meta-fictional, creating a new conversation between real and fiction and fills itself with reflections on the art of story-telling:
later fills itself of reflections on the art of story-telling:
'When I reflect on my story I seem to exist only as the one who came, the one who witnessed, the one who longed to be gone: a being without substance, a ghost beside the true body of Cruso. Is that the fate of all storytellers?'
And then the most important theme, the silent ones.
The narrator, for the most part, is Susan Barton. In Coetzee's alternative version, it is Susan who brought Crusoe's story to Foe (who is present as a character), for him to write. A voice that disappeared in Foe's book, just as the female voices usually disappeared from narratives written by men at that time. And she herself lacks the confidence, rather choosing to take the passive position of muse, who must speak through others.
Hers, though, is not the only silenced voice. Another silenced voice is that of Friday. Probably most remarkable feature of the Foe's book was Crusoe's slave Friday whom he named after the day he was found. The lack of a name in itself is symbolic. To drive the point home, Coetzee made Friday's silence physical by making him tongueless. Now, a real tribesman wouldn't probably won't be as submissive as Foe will have us believe, so much that'Man-Friday' the proverbial phrase, is derived from the name of this character, for a perfectly submissive servant but:
"Friday has no command of words and therefore no defense against being re-shaped day by day in
conformity with the desires of others."
Susan, a mother who has lost her daughter, adopts Friday.
"A woman may bear a child she does not want and rear it without loving it, yet be ready to defend it with her life."
In her compassion for Friday, she is able to see through the hypocrisy of Western Colonialism. Were Westerns really trying to civilize people or did they just wanted slaves:
"There are times when benevolence deserts me and I use words only as the shortest way to subject him to my will. At such times I understand why Cruso preferred not to disturb his muteness."
or
"How did he differ from one of the wild Indians whom explorers bring back with them, in a cargo of
parakeets and golden idols and indigo and skins of panthers, to show they have truly been to the Americas?"
And thus, Coetzee starts talking about the conditions of underdogs - women, Africans:
"How dismal a fate it would be to go through life unkissed! Yet if you remain in England, Friday, will that not become your fate? Where are you to meet a woman of your own people? We are not a nation rich in slaves."
Susan frequently compares Friday and at times herself to a dog, not to belittle Friday or herself but:
"Rather I wish to point to how• unnatural a lot it is for a dog or any other creature to be kept from its kind; also to how the impulse of love, which urges us toward our own kind, perishes during
confinement or loses its way."
Coetzee is very particular about animal rights, he has said something similar in 'Disgrace' as well.
Probably, talking about his own literary ambitions, Coetzee say, we must make the underdogs speak, must help them where they need help. Susan wants Friday to be able to speak, feeling the inhumanity and loneliness of the power she will otherwise have on Foe.
But she doesn't have high hopes:
"Nature did not intend me for a teacher, I lack patience."
The Foe of the story though is optimistic:
"The waterskater, that is an insect and dumb, traces the name of God on the surfaces of ponds, or so the Arabians say. None is so deprived that he cannot write."
Note- I haven't read Robinson Crusue, all information about that book I used here is Wiki-sourced.
November 6, 2020
"Usted nunca habrá oído una historia como la mía. Acabo de regresar de lejanas tierras. Naufragué y fui a parar a una isla desierta. Y en ella fui compañera de un hombre singular... Señor Foe, yo soy la viva imagen de la fortuna. De esa fortuna venturosa que estamos esperando."
Una de las cualidades que caracteriza a J. M. Coetzee es su innata capacidad de reversionar historias, de adaptarlas y darles un nuevo sentido. Este escritor sudafricano, que supo escribir excelente novelas y aún lo hace ("Desgracia" es una de sus mejores, a mi entender), puede también mutar camaleónicamente en otros personajes de la literatura en sus libros, tal fue el caso de su otra novela, "El maestro de Petersburgo", en la que se mete en la piel de un desesperado Fiódor Dostoievski que vuelve del auto exilio para rastrear el trágico desenlace de lo que le sucedió a su hijo Pavel en San Petersburgo.
De manera fehaciente, Coetzee nos sumerge en el submundo de los nihilistas del siglo XIX en la Rusia zarista a punto tal que nos es difícil discernir si la novela está escrita en ese siglo o más de cien años después.
En el caso de esta, nos volvemos a encontrar con la misma sensación de que estamos en la época en que los barcos eran las maquinarias más avanzadas de su época, en el siglo XVIII, cuando las grandes potencias como Inglaterra, Francia, España Estados Unidos o Portugal surcaban los mares en busca de tierras para conquistar.
De todas estas travesías, surgió una novela eterna que se llamó "La vida y las extrañas y sorprendentes aventuras de Robinson Crusoe", escrita por el gran Daniel Defoe en 1719, cuyo verdadero apellido era Foe y de ahí el nombre de la novela de Coetzee.
Robinson Crusoe, el inolvidable marinero se transforma en el más emblemático náufrago de la literatura y que iniciaría una saga de nombres que continuarían su estirpe: Arthur Gordon Pym, creado por Edgar Allan Poe, Alejandro Velasco, un náufrago real llevado a la literatura por Gabriel García Márquez y Henry Preston Standish, surgido de la pluma de un escritor desconocido, H. C. Lewis que escribe una novela también ejemplar al respecto.
De hecho el mismo Robinson volverá a surcar los mares y volverá a su amada isla en "Nuevas aventuras de Robinson Crusoe" para deleitar a los lectores que querían leer más de sus travesías.
Volviendo a Coetzee, este autor se encarga de escribir una precuela, o sea, la historia de una mujer, Susan Barton, quien, buscando a su hija al salir de Brasil en un barco, también naufraga luego de un motín en el mismo y por obra del azar y el destino termina siendo arrojada por las aguas en la misma isla de Robinson Crusoe quien ya está viviendo el último tramo de sus veinte años de náufrago en la isla junto a su fiel compañero, Viernes.
Lo que más atrae de esta novela, que es la segunda y más corta de Coetzee es que la readaptación de la novela de Defoe no tergiversa lo que ya leímos en ella, sino que lo transforma en una historia que conecta tanto a los personajes como a su autor real, o sea que la experiencia que Susan le narra a Defoe será el germen inicial de lo que posteriormente el autor escriba para transofmarla en "Robinson Crusoe".
Naturalmente, no todos los temas que Defoe toca en "Robinson Crusoe" están en esta novela, pero sí se hace hincapié en dos. Por un lado, se discurre largamente acerca de la esclavitud como crítica y no como fin y por el otro, se desarrolla la cuestión del canibalismo.
También es estudiado en forma intensiva el personaje de Viernes, quien en esta novela es mudo (su lengua ha sido cortada o por quienes lo tenían de esclavo o por el mismo Robinson, pero nunca lo sabemos y tampoco recuerdo este detalle en la novela original).
El caso de Viernes oficia a modo de enorme incógnita en toda la novela. Su mutismo acrecienta el misterio en el lector.
Es sabido que Daniel Defoe debió incluir el tema del canibalismo en la trama de su novela inicial, ya que temía que el interés del lector decayera, y sólo había una manera de mantenerlo atento: con la llegada de caníbales a la isla y además con una aventura posterior que incluye piratas y un cruento enfrentamiento.
Otro punto destacable de "Foe" es cómo está narrada ya que el autor la divide en solo cuatro capítulos: el primero cuenta de cómo Susan llegó a la isla y conoce a Crusoe (aunque en la novela se apellida Cruso, sin la e; luego, entre el segundo y tercer capítulo leemos las cartas que Susan le envía al autor y en otros apartados, nos encontramos con el diario que ella escribe y que forma parte de sus intentos por lograr primero encontrar a Defoe y luego que este cuente su historia a partir de una novela.
Las charlas, planteos y discusiones acerca de cómo dar a conocer la historia conforma el grueso del tercer capítulo en el que las diferencias entre Susan y Defoe salen a la luz.
El capítulo final es lo más desconcertante del libro y realmente no entendí el modo que Coetzee eligió para cerrar la novela. Tal vez algún lector que haya leído "Foe" me ayude a esclarecerlo.
De todos modos, eso no cambia mi percepción ni el gusto que me dio leer "Foe". Y sigo reafirmando que J. M. Coetzee es uno de los escritores más interesantes que he leído. Seguramente seguiré leyendo más de él.
Una de las cualidades que caracteriza a J. M. Coetzee es su innata capacidad de reversionar historias, de adaptarlas y darles un nuevo sentido. Este escritor sudafricano, que supo escribir excelente novelas y aún lo hace ("Desgracia" es una de sus mejores, a mi entender), puede también mutar camaleónicamente en otros personajes de la literatura en sus libros, tal fue el caso de su otra novela, "El maestro de Petersburgo", en la que se mete en la piel de un desesperado Fiódor Dostoievski que vuelve del auto exilio para rastrear el trágico desenlace de lo que le sucedió a su hijo Pavel en San Petersburgo.
De manera fehaciente, Coetzee nos sumerge en el submundo de los nihilistas del siglo XIX en la Rusia zarista a punto tal que nos es difícil discernir si la novela está escrita en ese siglo o más de cien años después.
En el caso de esta, nos volvemos a encontrar con la misma sensación de que estamos en la época en que los barcos eran las maquinarias más avanzadas de su época, en el siglo XVIII, cuando las grandes potencias como Inglaterra, Francia, España Estados Unidos o Portugal surcaban los mares en busca de tierras para conquistar.
De todas estas travesías, surgió una novela eterna que se llamó "La vida y las extrañas y sorprendentes aventuras de Robinson Crusoe", escrita por el gran Daniel Defoe en 1719, cuyo verdadero apellido era Foe y de ahí el nombre de la novela de Coetzee.
Robinson Crusoe, el inolvidable marinero se transforma en el más emblemático náufrago de la literatura y que iniciaría una saga de nombres que continuarían su estirpe: Arthur Gordon Pym, creado por Edgar Allan Poe, Alejandro Velasco, un náufrago real llevado a la literatura por Gabriel García Márquez y Henry Preston Standish, surgido de la pluma de un escritor desconocido, H. C. Lewis que escribe una novela también ejemplar al respecto.
De hecho el mismo Robinson volverá a surcar los mares y volverá a su amada isla en "Nuevas aventuras de Robinson Crusoe" para deleitar a los lectores que querían leer más de sus travesías.
Volviendo a Coetzee, este autor se encarga de escribir una precuela, o sea, la historia de una mujer, Susan Barton, quien, buscando a su hija al salir de Brasil en un barco, también naufraga luego de un motín en el mismo y por obra del azar y el destino termina siendo arrojada por las aguas en la misma isla de Robinson Crusoe quien ya está viviendo el último tramo de sus veinte años de náufrago en la isla junto a su fiel compañero, Viernes.
Lo que más atrae de esta novela, que es la segunda y más corta de Coetzee es que la readaptación de la novela de Defoe no tergiversa lo que ya leímos en ella, sino que lo transforma en una historia que conecta tanto a los personajes como a su autor real, o sea que la experiencia que Susan le narra a Defoe será el germen inicial de lo que posteriormente el autor escriba para transofmarla en "Robinson Crusoe".
Naturalmente, no todos los temas que Defoe toca en "Robinson Crusoe" están en esta novela, pero sí se hace hincapié en dos. Por un lado, se discurre largamente acerca de la esclavitud como crítica y no como fin y por el otro, se desarrolla la cuestión del canibalismo.
También es estudiado en forma intensiva el personaje de Viernes, quien en esta novela es mudo (su lengua ha sido cortada o por quienes lo tenían de esclavo o por el mismo Robinson, pero nunca lo sabemos y tampoco recuerdo este detalle en la novela original).
El caso de Viernes oficia a modo de enorme incógnita en toda la novela. Su mutismo acrecienta el misterio en el lector.
Es sabido que Daniel Defoe debió incluir el tema del canibalismo en la trama de su novela inicial, ya que temía que el interés del lector decayera, y sólo había una manera de mantenerlo atento: con la llegada de caníbales a la isla y además con una aventura posterior que incluye piratas y un cruento enfrentamiento.
Otro punto destacable de "Foe" es cómo está narrada ya que el autor la divide en solo cuatro capítulos: el primero cuenta de cómo Susan llegó a la isla y conoce a Crusoe (aunque en la novela se apellida Cruso, sin la e; luego, entre el segundo y tercer capítulo leemos las cartas que Susan le envía al autor y en otros apartados, nos encontramos con el diario que ella escribe y que forma parte de sus intentos por lograr primero encontrar a Defoe y luego que este cuente su historia a partir de una novela.
Las charlas, planteos y discusiones acerca de cómo dar a conocer la historia conforma el grueso del tercer capítulo en el que las diferencias entre Susan y Defoe salen a la luz.
El capítulo final es lo más desconcertante del libro y realmente no entendí el modo que Coetzee eligió para cerrar la novela. Tal vez algún lector que haya leído "Foe" me ayude a esclarecerlo.
De todos modos, eso no cambia mi percepción ni el gusto que me dio leer "Foe". Y sigo reafirmando que J. M. Coetzee es uno de los escritores más interesantes que he leído. Seguramente seguiré leyendo más de él.
January 14, 2016
This book is sheer poetry. The language, the pacing, the images - a feast for the mind!
As I see it Coetzee is the most important writer of our times. It is almost ridiculous to praise his style, as the way he formulates the questions and ideas of his writing is so perfectly self-contained and self-explanatory. Unaffected simplicity and clarity translate into utmost sophistication.
At the centre of his work lies the idea of compassion: for animals, for the ones left behind by society, for the crippled, for the ridiculous, for the invisible. A light is cast upon them in his writing by most naturally granting them the position of visible characters - no slick tricks, no handy word games. One of the most humbling of Coetzee's gifts.
I will keep coming back to this book, just like I do with all of Coetzee's books, in hope to prevent myself from forgetting their questions and at the same time to grant myself relief though his unparalleled art of conveying them.
As I see it Coetzee is the most important writer of our times. It is almost ridiculous to praise his style, as the way he formulates the questions and ideas of his writing is so perfectly self-contained and self-explanatory. Unaffected simplicity and clarity translate into utmost sophistication.
At the centre of his work lies the idea of compassion: for animals, for the ones left behind by society, for the crippled, for the ridiculous, for the invisible. A light is cast upon them in his writing by most naturally granting them the position of visible characters - no slick tricks, no handy word games. One of the most humbling of Coetzee's gifts.
I will keep coming back to this book, just like I do with all of Coetzee's books, in hope to prevent myself from forgetting their questions and at the same time to grant myself relief though his unparalleled art of conveying them.
November 20, 2014
In Foe, Susan Barton is set adrift in a rowboat after a mutiny on a ship sailing from South America to Lisbon. She lands on an island where Cruso and Friday had been cast away years ago. In Coetzee's retelling of the Robinson Crusoe tale, Cruso is content with his simple life on the island. Friday has been transformed from a Caribbean to a black African whose tongue had been cut out by slave owners. The three castaways are rescued after Susan has spent one year on the island, but Cruso dies on his way back to Europe.
Susan wants to write their story so she contacts the author Daniel Foe to turn her narration into a book. But Foe wants to tell a different story about Susan than the one she thinks is important. Susan is also disturbed about Friday's lack of a voice. Although Friday has been liberated from slavery, he cannot ever really be free with no voice. The theme seems to be that the oppressed and disadvantaged have been silenced, and lost the authorship of their own stories.
J.M. Coetzee was writing in 1986 in South Africa where communication problems and cultural differences existed between the black Africans and white colonialists. The original Crusoe story was a fictional autobiography and adventure story with 17th Century ideas about colonialism, gender, and slavery. Coetzee has updated the tale by adding a woman narrator, an African servant, and a 20th Century outlook.
Susan wants to write their story so she contacts the author Daniel Foe to turn her narration into a book. But Foe wants to tell a different story about Susan than the one she thinks is important. Susan is also disturbed about Friday's lack of a voice. Although Friday has been liberated from slavery, he cannot ever really be free with no voice. The theme seems to be that the oppressed and disadvantaged have been silenced, and lost the authorship of their own stories.
J.M. Coetzee was writing in 1986 in South Africa where communication problems and cultural differences existed between the black Africans and white colonialists. The original Crusoe story was a fictional autobiography and adventure story with 17th Century ideas about colonialism, gender, and slavery. Coetzee has updated the tale by adding a woman narrator, an African servant, and a 20th Century outlook.
October 9, 2007
In recent readings of Coetzee's Defoe-pastiche, I have become facinated with the figure of Friday's "empty" mouth. Obviously the open-O, the unvoiced scream, the signs arranged on the beach as evidence of Friday's voice as it is both silenced and withheld, speaks to the trope of subaltern. That said, I believe Coetzee is more interested in our assumption that Friday is without a speech organ, tongue-less. Recall that the only evidence of this tonguelessness comes from the travel narrative that Crusoe gives where he imagines Friday's suffering at the hands of slave-traders and other "savages", as well, in each instance of Susan's quest to see the "stub", the remains, she turns away from what she imagines will be too physical and too evocative fleshy remnants. What does it mean that we fill in the gap in the gape? Friday is tongueless because we agree to the imagining protocol that names him as such?
February 9, 2015
Foe reminds me more of Robert Coover's multilayered, metafictional Spanking the Maid than of Robinson Crusoe. That book was about spanking, and this book is about getting ravished. But what's it really about, you ask, and I'm like ugh, isn't "multilayered and metafictional" enough? Fine, god. I'll mark serious spoilers but we'll discuss general plot points, so heads up.
On the first layer: Susan Barton is marooned on an island already inhabited by two other castaways. When she is rescued, she tries to sell her story. There are mysteries: one of the other castaways is mute. Supposedly his tongue was cut out, but she fails to verify this. Who cut out his tongue? Or did anyone? And who is the woman who shows up claiming to be her long-lost daughter?
Below that, it's about Daniel Defoe's 1719 classic Robinson Crusoe: the other two castaways are Cruso [sic] and Friday. The author she attempts to sell her story to is Foe [sic] himself. So this is metafiction, and here's another mystery: why didn't Barton herself make it into Foe's novel?
And below that, it's about the process of storytelling: whose stories are heard and whose are silenced and which truth gets told. Coetzee pretends that [De]foe wrote his books from life, but changed them to make them more entertaining. The version he eventually published has virtually nothing to do with its inspiration.
(Several of Defoe's other characters also show up here to help make the point. And it's true, actually, although not in the way Coetzee presents it: Defoe was inspired by the story of castaway Alexander Selkirk.)
Coetzee is South African, and he wrote Foe in the 80s, at the height of the controversy over a soon-to-die apartheid. When he presents Friday as mysteriously mute - the only character unable to tell his own story - he's talking about his country. He said that "South African literature is a literature in bondage. It is a less than fully human literature." That's what Friday represents, this less than fully human literature.
So the third level answers the questions of the first two.
Honestly, I think the book descends a little into wankery starting around Part III, 3/4 of the way through the book. It stops creating story and starts talking about it, and it's a bit on the tedious side. But it's done enough by that point to earn a little wanking; it's a very good book. Multilayered! And metafictional.
On the first layer: Susan Barton is marooned on an island already inhabited by two other castaways. When she is rescued, she tries to sell her story. There are mysteries: one of the other castaways is mute. Supposedly his tongue was cut out, but she fails to verify this. Who cut out his tongue? Or did anyone? And who is the woman who shows up claiming to be her long-lost daughter?
Below that, it's about Daniel Defoe's 1719 classic Robinson Crusoe: the other two castaways are Cruso [sic] and Friday. The author she attempts to sell her story to is Foe [sic] himself. So this is metafiction, and here's another mystery: why didn't Barton herself make it into Foe's novel?
And below that, it's about the process of storytelling: whose stories are heard and whose are silenced and which truth gets told. Coetzee pretends that [De]foe wrote his books from life, but changed them to make them more entertaining. The version he eventually published has virtually nothing to do with its inspiration.
(Several of Defoe's other characters also show up here to help make the point. And it's true, actually, although not in the way Coetzee presents it: Defoe was inspired by the story of castaway Alexander Selkirk.)
Coetzee is South African, and he wrote Foe in the 80s, at the height of the controversy over a soon-to-die apartheid. When he presents Friday as mysteriously mute - the only character unable to tell his own story - he's talking about his country. He said that "South African literature is a literature in bondage. It is a less than fully human literature." That's what Friday represents, this less than fully human literature.
So the third level answers the questions of the first two.
Honestly, I think the book descends a little into wankery starting around Part III, 3/4 of the way through the book. It stops creating story and starts talking about it, and it's a bit on the tedious side. But it's done enough by that point to earn a little wanking; it's a very good book. Multilayered! And metafictional.
November 15, 2018
Fancy being driven to pictures.
When I read a novel, I'm looking for this:
and this:
with big hints along the way like:
and this:
I thought I was doing fine with this Coetzee I found in Leiden recently. There's a woman and she is on a desert island for a while and then she's rescued and she's bogged down with Man Friday and Daniel Defoe's in it writing her story and I thought I got it. But I couldn't help feeling now and again like:
and trying to figure it all out made things worse.
Frankly, in the end, I felt like I was in the middle of xkcd's google map directions (goodreads has made a hash of this, please go link: here to see it:
I don't know, Mr Coetzee. I really don't know. I wish when I'd got to the lake and saw the trouble ahead, I'd just turned back. I'm going to have a lie down and a nice cup of tea now. That's if I'm still alive, if I was real. Perhaps the book has the answer to that.
When I read a novel, I'm looking for this:
and this:
with big hints along the way like:
and this:
I thought I was doing fine with this Coetzee I found in Leiden recently. There's a woman and she is on a desert island for a while and then she's rescued and she's bogged down with Man Friday and Daniel Defoe's in it writing her story and I thought I got it. But I couldn't help feeling now and again like:
and trying to figure it all out made things worse.
Frankly, in the end, I felt like I was in the middle of xkcd's google map directions (goodreads has made a hash of this, please go link: here to see it:
I don't know, Mr Coetzee. I really don't know. I wish when I'd got to the lake and saw the trouble ahead, I'd just turned back. I'm going to have a lie down and a nice cup of tea now. That's if I'm still alive, if I was real. Perhaps the book has the answer to that.
September 22, 2020
Kucijev "Fo", koji je prvi put objavljen 1986. godine, nudi nam jedan novi pogled na dobro poznatu priču o Defou i Robinzonu Krusou. Ta se novina ogleda u uvođenju novih likova, kao i preplitanju tekstualnih i vantekstualnih svjetova. Šta to konkretno znači? Kuci u priču uvodi i lik Suzan Barton, koja, nakon što izbija pobuna na brodu na kojem se nalazi, biva ostavljena usred mora, a potom završava na pustom (ili ne baš tako pustom) ostrvu, gdje sreće Robinzona i Petka. Ne, ova knjiga nije zamišljena kao prepričavanje istih ili sličnih avantura i događaja sa nešto proširenom postavkom likova, što postaje jasno već u trenutku kada se priča, nedugo nakon samog početka, izmješta s ostrva u London, gdje Suzan dolazi do Danijela Foa, koji treba da zapravo uzme njenu priču i uobliči je u jedno valjano djelo. Još je dosta tu nekih sitnijih i krupnijih događaja koji se smjenjuju i više ili manje jasno usmjeravaju djelovanje junaka, ali jedna od glavnih tema koja je obrađena na stranicama ove knjige jeste pitanje moći riječi, tj. govora, odnosno pravo i sloboda da se osoba kao jedinka izražava, a shodno tome i gubitak istog prava. Odnos između Suzan, Foa, Petka i Robinzona, tako, postaje gusto isprepletena mreža odnosa povlašćenih i potčinjenih, privilegovanih i onih koji su lišeni svega, pa i mogućnosti da sopstvenim govorom posvjedoče o svojoj sudbini, a u slučaju da to na neki način i učine, onda da budu saslušani na odgovarajući način. Idejno, knjiga je fenomenalna, ali zaista. Pravi je primjer toga kako se dobro poznati književni predložak može uzeti kao obrazac za neke univerzalne priče ispričane na novi, a opet upečatljiv i specifičan način. S druge strane, ovo jeste roman o govoru i riječima i iskazivanju, ali je u njemu i mnogo toga fragmentarnog i neizgovorenog i konfuznog. I sve više i više što se priča bliži kraju. Da, mozak jasno govori da to ima i te kako smisla kad se uzme u obzir tema koja je u srži romana, ali užitak samog čitanja nekako ostaje u drugom planu zbog te konfuznosti koja se samo pojačava i pojačava.
December 29, 2015
It is difficult to describe. The quality of the writing is great, the characters are good and sometimes the book grips you.
There are even moments that reminded me of Animal Man by Grant Morrison, but when I finished the book it was.. And???
It could be a **, it could be a ****... Let's rate it with a ***.
Finally, I have to say that the character of Susan Barton is probably one of the most powerful female characters that I have met.
There are even moments that reminded me of Animal Man by Grant Morrison, but when I finished the book it was.. And???
It could be a **, it could be a ****... Let's rate it with a ***.
Finally, I have to say that the character of Susan Barton is probably one of the most powerful female characters that I have met.
December 9, 2011
I read this a long time ago and have only just got round to thinking about a review now. Now is me sitting in front a netbook with a large glass of red wine, the work phone switched off (praise all your gods, it is the weekend) and a pile of salted cashew nuts to hand. You could cast me adrift on a desert island now, with no hope of redemption and as long as I could take the wine and the nuts (I'll leave the works phone, thanks) then I probably wouldn't utter so much as a squeak of protest.
Turns out that leaving it a while to review this book was probably a tactical faux pas on my part because it has not left enough of an impression to allow the memories of salient points ( a fellow goodreader pointed out today that book amnesia is frequently the benchmark of a bad book), witty lines and poetic description to come flooding back. Give me an hour, more wine and I'll probably fill in the blanks with some kind of skewed version of Coetzee's sequel/ parallel to Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (recently read and reviewed), but I'll try to finish writing before it gets to that sloppy point.
In lieu of being able to offer any new startling observations on this text I have just read two excellent reviews:
Chris Holmes' http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
and Brian's review http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
both which are worth reading with or without the wine.
Coetzee tackles the story of Robinson Crusoe and his castaway years by adding into the mix, a female companion who has returned to England and brought with her the story of her life on an island with the now deceased Cruso and the man Friday. The story she tells is very different to that of the Crusoe we know from popular publication. Does this make it any less true? I suppose the point is that communication, or if you are Friday, lack thereof, is constantly open to interpretation. Is what we say actually interpreted by those who hear it in the way we mean it? Probably not. The faceless communications of today (text, Tweet, blog and even goodreads) leave a lot of scope for misinterpretation and error. With Cruso I guess the question is, how much of his-story is in this case her story?
Turns out that leaving it a while to review this book was probably a tactical faux pas on my part because it has not left enough of an impression to allow the memories of salient points ( a fellow goodreader pointed out today that book amnesia is frequently the benchmark of a bad book), witty lines and poetic description to come flooding back. Give me an hour, more wine and I'll probably fill in the blanks with some kind of skewed version of Coetzee's sequel/ parallel to Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (recently read and reviewed), but I'll try to finish writing before it gets to that sloppy point.
In lieu of being able to offer any new startling observations on this text I have just read two excellent reviews:
Chris Holmes' http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
and Brian's review http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
both which are worth reading with or without the wine.
Coetzee tackles the story of Robinson Crusoe and his castaway years by adding into the mix, a female companion who has returned to England and brought with her the story of her life on an island with the now deceased Cruso and the man Friday. The story she tells is very different to that of the Crusoe we know from popular publication. Does this make it any less true? I suppose the point is that communication, or if you are Friday, lack thereof, is constantly open to interpretation. Is what we say actually interpreted by those who hear it in the way we mean it? Probably not. The faceless communications of today (text, Tweet, blog and even goodreads) leave a lot of scope for misinterpretation and error. With Cruso I guess the question is, how much of his-story is in this case her story?
May 23, 2010
It's not hard to see what drew Coetzee to the Cruso myth. Stranded on an austere patch of land with only a black servant to keep you company: reminds me an awful lot of the author's native South Africa. The long first section of the book, in which Susan Barton washes ashore on Cruso's island, is a tour-de-force, one of the best sustained pieces of writing Coetzee's ever done. But the shift to England, where Susan enlists Daniel Defoe to write her story, comes along with endless ruminations on the interplay between between fact and fiction--questions over who is truly birthing the story and, god help us, the role of the muse--and the thing gets rather tiresome. Coetzee has this in common with Italo Calvino: he's an elegant, world-class writer who nonetheless could get diverted by meta-fictional games that, I'm sorry, are a little beneath him.
Meanwhile, the author's refusal to resolve intriguing questions he's set up--such as the true identity of a girl who claims to be Susan's long-lost daughter--strikes me as needlessly tight-assed. I'm all for subtlety, but this book keeps too many secrets to itself. The way Susan leads the girl into a forest and leaves her there could have had the uncanny force of a Hawthorne story (think of something like "Roger Malvin's Burial"); instead, it simply seems unfinished.
Still, the settings are beautifully wrought, and in Friday's plight Coetzee shows us how slavery scrapes hollow not only the slave but the master: late in the book, Susan tries to put Friday back on a boat to Africa, but there is nowhere for him to go--his Africa is long gone. This is a noble failure of a book if ever there was one.
For those interested in cover art: the cover painting is by John Collier, whose art appears on all the Penguin editions of Coetzee's books, and is a haunting piece of work.
Meanwhile, the author's refusal to resolve intriguing questions he's set up--such as the true identity of a girl who claims to be Susan's long-lost daughter--strikes me as needlessly tight-assed. I'm all for subtlety, but this book keeps too many secrets to itself. The way Susan leads the girl into a forest and leaves her there could have had the uncanny force of a Hawthorne story (think of something like "Roger Malvin's Burial"); instead, it simply seems unfinished.
Still, the settings are beautifully wrought, and in Friday's plight Coetzee shows us how slavery scrapes hollow not only the slave but the master: late in the book, Susan tries to put Friday back on a boat to Africa, but there is nowhere for him to go--his Africa is long gone. This is a noble failure of a book if ever there was one.
For those interested in cover art: the cover painting is by John Collier, whose art appears on all the Penguin editions of Coetzee's books, and is a haunting piece of work.
July 28, 2014
I keep wanting to like Coetzee, but I just can't get past my irritation at his characters' voices and the opaque symbolism scattered throughout. This is my second venture into one of his novels (the first being "Disgrace") and while I'm interested in the themes he explores, I can't get past the pretensions of his prose to actually be engaged by his writing.
March 17, 2009
J.M. Coetzee's 1986 novel FOE is a retelling of ROBINSON CRUSOE that uses Daniel Defoe's well-known story as a basis for a bitter commentary on colonialism. To really get anything out of Coetzee's novel, you'll need to read ROBINSON CRUSOE first. The Penguin Popular Classics edition is an inexpensive way to read that important work.
As FOE opens, we are introduced to Susan Barton, an Englishwoman returning from Brazil who is set adrift on the seas by mutineers. She washes up on an island populated by Robinson Crusoe and his servant Friday. Yet, these are not the same characters we've encountered before. Unlike the clever protagonist of Defoe's novel, "Cruso" is a dull old man, complacent with his miserable existence on the island, not wanting rescue and making no effort to better his living condition. Friday is not a the Brazilian cannibal that Defoe portrayed, but a horribly mutilated African slave. When the trio is finally rescued, Cruso soon dies, but Barton and Friday return to England. There Barton encounters Mr. Foe and narrates her story to him, only to find that he is not interested in the remarkable truth of her experiences, but instead bends the story to his own preconceptions.
Coetzee's main message seems to be that Europeans have robbed colonized peoples of their own history. By supressing any report they might make of their past, and forbidding them from speaking now for themselves, the colonizers have reduced the natives to the very savages Europeans claimed they were from the beginning. Towards the end of the novel, Coetzee turns things even more postmodernism, showing how difficult it is to create a "true" narrative.
If I had to compare Coetzee's writing here to anyone else, I'd say that the dialogue reminds me of Harold Pinter, and the enigmatic dream or dream-like sequences towards the end are reminiscent of Gene Wolfe. The novel is only around 150 pages long and can be tranquilly read over the span of a few hours. I found the narrative style somewhat grating, thus my review of four stars, but nonetheless I found this a remarkable and extremely thought-provoking book, and I recommend it.
As FOE opens, we are introduced to Susan Barton, an Englishwoman returning from Brazil who is set adrift on the seas by mutineers. She washes up on an island populated by Robinson Crusoe and his servant Friday. Yet, these are not the same characters we've encountered before. Unlike the clever protagonist of Defoe's novel, "Cruso" is a dull old man, complacent with his miserable existence on the island, not wanting rescue and making no effort to better his living condition. Friday is not a the Brazilian cannibal that Defoe portrayed, but a horribly mutilated African slave. When the trio is finally rescued, Cruso soon dies, but Barton and Friday return to England. There Barton encounters Mr. Foe and narrates her story to him, only to find that he is not interested in the remarkable truth of her experiences, but instead bends the story to his own preconceptions.
Coetzee's main message seems to be that Europeans have robbed colonized peoples of their own history. By supressing any report they might make of their past, and forbidding them from speaking now for themselves, the colonizers have reduced the natives to the very savages Europeans claimed they were from the beginning. Towards the end of the novel, Coetzee turns things even more postmodernism, showing how difficult it is to create a "true" narrative.
If I had to compare Coetzee's writing here to anyone else, I'd say that the dialogue reminds me of Harold Pinter, and the enigmatic dream or dream-like sequences towards the end are reminiscent of Gene Wolfe. The novel is only around 150 pages long and can be tranquilly read over the span of a few hours. I found the narrative style somewhat grating, thus my review of four stars, but nonetheless I found this a remarkable and extremely thought-provoking book, and I recommend it.
March 5, 2020
This completes my detoxification of Robinson Crusoe. Foe is Coetzee’s elegant, imaginative examination of Defoe’s classic. Its not a retelling or a sequel - it recreates a new dish from the same ingredients. Crusoe (Cruso here) dies early on & Coetzee introduces a woman character as the lead and Defoe himself (under his ‘real’ name, Foe). The cleverest conceit of all is that Friday’s role is greatly expanded, but as in the original, he remains completely mute. Coetzee makes this muteness speak volumes. Post-modern and post-colonial, Foe is also a meditation on story-telling and the life (as opposed to the death, cf Barthes) of the author.
August 21, 2016
In the spirit of Foe, a story about this book... I bought this book at a recent $5 A Bag book sale at the library. Having walked away with 4 bags of books, it seemed like a pretty successful sale in and of itself. However, fate intervenes (dun dun DUN) and, picking it up to read tonight, I see a very familiar name scrawled in the front cover, a date/locale, and a seal imprinted on the title page. None other than the name of my favorite teacher back in high school and the date of my graduation. A favorite teacher that has since passed away but is sorely missed. Coincidence might be the invention of the storyteller here, but it's a coincidence I'm very happy about.
The book itself was interesting, both as a reinvention of Crusoe and a stand-alone. I was almost expecting a The Yellow Wallpaper twist to come into play. Definitely worth the read.
The book itself was interesting, both as a reinvention of Crusoe and a stand-alone. I was almost expecting a The Yellow Wallpaper twist to come into play. Definitely worth the read.
October 1, 2023
„Fo“ je jedna od meni najdražih Kucijevih knjiga, i najdražih knjiga uopšte. Čitalac koji se po prvi put sreće sa delom velikog maga, može u njoj pronaći iscrtanu mapu, ili šifrarnik za prepoznavanje velikog broja tema kojima će se ovaj autor baviti u svem svom stvaralaštvu. Ono što je tu meni najvažnije, i gde se Kuci kao pisac/mislilac i ja kao čitalac/zbunjenik/nepomirenik-sa-nepoznanicama najviše dodirujemo jeste problem bezglasnosti, odnosno važnosti glasa koji neko nema (recimo, bezglasne životinje), ili mu je nasilno oduzet (na rasnoj ili rodnoj osnovi), ili se pravimo da ne postoji glas koji bi se možda mogao razumeti. Kuci dolazi iz južnoafričkog podneblja što nužno nameće propitivanje odnosa između crnaca i belaca. On je belac, no njegova propitavanja ne daju jednostavne i očekivane odgovore (što ga beskrajno uzdiže u mojim očima), jer jednostavni odgovori na komplikovana pitanja uvek znače rezove, bolne i diskriminišuće. Ono što je njegova možda osnovna „misija“ (iako sam sigurna da on sam ne bi pristao da mu se prišiva postojanje neke misije) upravo je davanje glasa svim subjektima određenih odnosa, ili slikanje situacija u kojima bezglasna bića ostaju zarobljena i zaboravljena, unižena, silovana, kremirana, zlostavljana, nasilno obezjezičena, ili se ono što imaju da kažu izvrće iz raznih razloga tako što se u komunikaciju umeša određeni posrednik.
Knjiga „Fo“ (neobičnog imena, no – rastumačićemo ga tokom pažljivog čitanja) kao osnovu uzima poznatu radnju: brodolom, no ovoga puta ne samo brodolom muškarca, Krusoa, već i žene (naknadno pristigle saputnice, koja je tu možda samo da pravi dodatnu zbrku, ili ipak zato što je potrebno i njoj podariti glas). Pošto već od prvog pasusa primećujemo navodnike, jasno je da narator ove priče nekome (ne čitaocu, već nekom posredniku) priča ili ispisuje svoju pustolovinu. Narator(ka) je Suzan Barton, junakinja jednog drugog Defoovog romana, koja se Kucijevom majstorijom povezuje sa mnogo poznatijom Robinsonovom pustolovinom. Ona je bila na brodu nakon neuspele potrage za ćerkom u Brazilu, odakle se otisnula sa sumnjivom posadom i završila, posle pobune, u čamcu sa svojim mrtvim ljubavnikom – kapetanom broda. Odustavši od veslanja, kliznula je u more i plivajući, potpomognuta talasima, stigla do ostrva.
Ono što opisuje kao život na ostrvu razlikuje se u velikoj meri od opisa koji nam je dao Defo. Svi smo voleli Robinsona – ali, je li ta avantura verodostojna? To je jedno od pitanja koje Kuci nenametljivo postavlja, a može biti ključno za razumevanje ove knjige. Suzan Barton zatiče mrzovoljnog starca koji ne piše dnevnik, koji provodi vreme praveći terase pogodne da se jednog dana na njima zaseje neko seme, samo što semena nema a pitanje je i da li će ikad iko sa semenom doći na njegovo ostrvo. Ipak, njegov trud možda nije ništa besmisleniji od bilo koje druge ljudske aktivnosti (pogotovo ako se svaki ljudski život shvati kao ostrvo, što bi obezvredilo sva naša nastojanja, a još više ako se svaki život shvati kao mogućnost da se ostrva povežu i da se nekom nešto ostavi i nakon smrti). Sa njim je i Petko, njegov sluga, poslušni crnac koji ne govori, jer mu je, avaj, odsečen jezik. (Suzan nikad ne saznaje ko je to učinio, trgovci robljem ili...?) Robinson odbija bilo kakvu mogućnost da osavremeni išta dok živi na ostrvu, tako da oštro odgovara na sva pitanja junakinje (ona ovde može biti shvaćena čak i kao neka vrsta Eve, pa bi i njena nagovaranja da preduzmu nešto mogla biti svojevrsna želja da se ubere plod sa drveta saznanja). Naravno, Robinson, kao muškarac i belac – gospodar je i tog ostrva i njegovih stanovnika: crnca i žene.
On, ipak, nije zdrav, i tokom jednog od nastupa njegove bolesti – iznenada dolazi spasilački brod. Robinson umire na putu ka Engleskoj, dok žena i crnac ostaju prepušteni sebi. Sebi i još nekom: piscu.
Suzan Barton pokušava da ispriča (i proda!) svoju pustolovinu izvesnom Fou (to je, možda Danijel De Fo, pisan namerno tako da ovo Fo bude odvojeno, i da nas podseća na pitanje „Friend or foe?“). Njemu se čini da tu pustolovinu treba malo nafilovati. Čini mu se da njena istina nije toliko važna (kao istina priče, istina teksta, umetnička istina – ili možda samo kao zanimljivost koja se može bolje prodati?). U tom rascepu nastaju najvažnije diskusije koje Kuci pokreće ovim nevelikim romanom. U delovima teksta koje Suzan Barton nevešto ispisuje trudeći se da ih nekako prosledi piscu nalazi se njen stvarni život (da li?) ili bar ono što ona smatra istinom svog života. Je li pisac prijatelj ili neprijatelj ako njenu priču koristi kao objekat da bi izmislio neku drugu? Ko je tu stvaran, a ko nestvaran? Ne samo da ono što je njoj važno pretvara u manje važnu epizodu jedne šire priče o kojoj ona ne želi da govori, već joj pridružuje lažnu ćerku i njenu dadilju (stvarajući tako konfuziju iz koje nam postaje nejasno ko je živ a ko lik u priči, nisu li sve te žene samo figurice u njegovoj igri). Za sve to vreme, Petko je uz njih kao izvestan teret (ili su ONI NJEMU teret), bez jezika, nalazeći svoje načine da izrazi određene emocije, ili da se igra, da sprovodi svoje rituale, i da pokazuje da je ne samo ljudsko biće, nego da ono što on ima da kaže čeka da bude rečeno, makar ispod površine, među olupinama, među mrtvim robovima i morskim travama, zajedno sa krakenom – svojevsnim „pupkom sveta“ koji negde u dubini jednako plaši, posmatra i guta sve čemu dođe vreme da bude progutano. Petkova priča biće ispričana, možda kao bujica, možda kao udarac krakenovog kraka. Možda je način da pisac prestane da bude neprijatelj upravo u tome – da što poštenije traga za glasom onih kojima je (nasilno ili ne) glas oduzet ili falsifikovan. Pisac je i sam neko ko pisanjem pokušava da podari sebi glas (koji možda nije našao kroz neki drugačiji kanal, kroz uobičajenu govornu komunikaciju), sa željom da bude istinit ili bar dovoljno čujan. I o tome govore neke sporadično razbacane rečenice u raznim Kucijevim romanima, u kojima glavni junaci često lutaju nekim svojim bespućima kao da je svima njima odsečen jezik. Na kraju krajeva, ko se od nas nije bar nekad osećao kao da mu je jezik iščupan? Jezik možda nije srce, a bog možda nije stvorio prvo reč, nego nešto što se ne mora izgovoriti da bi bilo čujno. Možda se istina i važnost bića može na drugi način iskazati – ali onda je ono što je svima nama potrebno: neko čulo koje će biti sposobno da čuje sve varijante iskazivanja kojima se služi sve što je živo. Recimo da je to sasvim dovoljno da iskaže šta bi mogla biti (čak i neosvešćena i nepriznata) misija jednog pisca kakav je ovaj veliki čarobnjak. Velika preporuka za čitanje – pogotovo publici koja razume i podržava potrebu da literatura osim zanimljivosti, pustolovine i romantike progovori i nemuštim glasovima nasilno ućutkanih i gurnutih pod plašt nevidljivosti.
Knjiga „Fo“ (neobičnog imena, no – rastumačićemo ga tokom pažljivog čitanja) kao osnovu uzima poznatu radnju: brodolom, no ovoga puta ne samo brodolom muškarca, Krusoa, već i žene (naknadno pristigle saputnice, koja je tu možda samo da pravi dodatnu zbrku, ili ipak zato što je potrebno i njoj podariti glas). Pošto već od prvog pasusa primećujemo navodnike, jasno je da narator ove priče nekome (ne čitaocu, već nekom posredniku) priča ili ispisuje svoju pustolovinu. Narator(ka) je Suzan Barton, junakinja jednog drugog Defoovog romana, koja se Kucijevom majstorijom povezuje sa mnogo poznatijom Robinsonovom pustolovinom. Ona je bila na brodu nakon neuspele potrage za ćerkom u Brazilu, odakle se otisnula sa sumnjivom posadom i završila, posle pobune, u čamcu sa svojim mrtvim ljubavnikom – kapetanom broda. Odustavši od veslanja, kliznula je u more i plivajući, potpomognuta talasima, stigla do ostrva.
Ono što opisuje kao život na ostrvu razlikuje se u velikoj meri od opisa koji nam je dao Defo. Svi smo voleli Robinsona – ali, je li ta avantura verodostojna? To je jedno od pitanja koje Kuci nenametljivo postavlja, a može biti ključno za razumevanje ove knjige. Suzan Barton zatiče mrzovoljnog starca koji ne piše dnevnik, koji provodi vreme praveći terase pogodne da se jednog dana na njima zaseje neko seme, samo što semena nema a pitanje je i da li će ikad iko sa semenom doći na njegovo ostrvo. Ipak, njegov trud možda nije ništa besmisleniji od bilo koje druge ljudske aktivnosti (pogotovo ako se svaki ljudski život shvati kao ostrvo, što bi obezvredilo sva naša nastojanja, a još više ako se svaki život shvati kao mogućnost da se ostrva povežu i da se nekom nešto ostavi i nakon smrti). Sa njim je i Petko, njegov sluga, poslušni crnac koji ne govori, jer mu je, avaj, odsečen jezik. (Suzan nikad ne saznaje ko je to učinio, trgovci robljem ili...?) Robinson odbija bilo kakvu mogućnost da osavremeni išta dok živi na ostrvu, tako da oštro odgovara na sva pitanja junakinje (ona ovde može biti shvaćena čak i kao neka vrsta Eve, pa bi i njena nagovaranja da preduzmu nešto mogla biti svojevrsna želja da se ubere plod sa drveta saznanja). Naravno, Robinson, kao muškarac i belac – gospodar je i tog ostrva i njegovih stanovnika: crnca i žene.
On, ipak, nije zdrav, i tokom jednog od nastupa njegove bolesti – iznenada dolazi spasilački brod. Robinson umire na putu ka Engleskoj, dok žena i crnac ostaju prepušteni sebi. Sebi i još nekom: piscu.
Suzan Barton pokušava da ispriča (i proda!) svoju pustolovinu izvesnom Fou (to je, možda Danijel De Fo, pisan namerno tako da ovo Fo bude odvojeno, i da nas podseća na pitanje „Friend or foe?“). Njemu se čini da tu pustolovinu treba malo nafilovati. Čini mu se da njena istina nije toliko važna (kao istina priče, istina teksta, umetnička istina – ili možda samo kao zanimljivost koja se može bolje prodati?). U tom rascepu nastaju najvažnije diskusije koje Kuci pokreće ovim nevelikim romanom. U delovima teksta koje Suzan Barton nevešto ispisuje trudeći se da ih nekako prosledi piscu nalazi se njen stvarni život (da li?) ili bar ono što ona smatra istinom svog života. Je li pisac prijatelj ili neprijatelj ako njenu priču koristi kao objekat da bi izmislio neku drugu? Ko je tu stvaran, a ko nestvaran? Ne samo da ono što je njoj važno pretvara u manje važnu epizodu jedne šire priče o kojoj ona ne želi da govori, već joj pridružuje lažnu ćerku i njenu dadilju (stvarajući tako konfuziju iz koje nam postaje nejasno ko je živ a ko lik u priči, nisu li sve te žene samo figurice u njegovoj igri). Za sve to vreme, Petko je uz njih kao izvestan teret (ili su ONI NJEMU teret), bez jezika, nalazeći svoje načine da izrazi određene emocije, ili da se igra, da sprovodi svoje rituale, i da pokazuje da je ne samo ljudsko biće, nego da ono što on ima da kaže čeka da bude rečeno, makar ispod površine, među olupinama, među mrtvim robovima i morskim travama, zajedno sa krakenom – svojevsnim „pupkom sveta“ koji negde u dubini jednako plaši, posmatra i guta sve čemu dođe vreme da bude progutano. Petkova priča biće ispričana, možda kao bujica, možda kao udarac krakenovog kraka. Možda je način da pisac prestane da bude neprijatelj upravo u tome – da što poštenije traga za glasom onih kojima je (nasilno ili ne) glas oduzet ili falsifikovan. Pisac je i sam neko ko pisanjem pokušava da podari sebi glas (koji možda nije našao kroz neki drugačiji kanal, kroz uobičajenu govornu komunikaciju), sa željom da bude istinit ili bar dovoljno čujan. I o tome govore neke sporadično razbacane rečenice u raznim Kucijevim romanima, u kojima glavni junaci često lutaju nekim svojim bespućima kao da je svima njima odsečen jezik. Na kraju krajeva, ko se od nas nije bar nekad osećao kao da mu je jezik iščupan? Jezik možda nije srce, a bog možda nije stvorio prvo reč, nego nešto što se ne mora izgovoriti da bi bilo čujno. Možda se istina i važnost bića može na drugi način iskazati – ali onda je ono što je svima nama potrebno: neko čulo koje će biti sposobno da čuje sve varijante iskazivanja kojima se služi sve što je živo. Recimo da je to sasvim dovoljno da iskaže šta bi mogla biti (čak i neosvešćena i nepriznata) misija jednog pisca kakav je ovaj veliki čarobnjak. Velika preporuka za čitanje – pogotovo publici koja razume i podržava potrebu da literatura osim zanimljivosti, pustolovine i romantike progovori i nemuštim glasovima nasilno ućutkanih i gurnutih pod plašt nevidljivosti.
March 18, 2020
Atmospheric and thought-provoking, but ultimately too reticent to be either satisfying or fully engaging.
Foe is a consciously literary novel. The first section is exquisitely rendered, but as soon as the metafiction really kicks in, I found it obtrusive. The exploration of the blurred lines between fiction and reality, power and language, Friday’s story and the notion of double consciousness (and of being a stranger everywhere, even his own homeland, were he to return) is fascinating – it’s a shame the narrative descends into the pretentious, only to drown in its own artifice. (That ending, though?!)
I disliked the way Coetzee depicted women here. Quite frankly, I wanted to throttle Susan for her subservience, whining and bizarre decisions. Perhaps the worst, however, was the visitations of the muse. (Ugh.) It is interesting that Coetzee chose to introduce a woman into the narrative, but it becomes clear fairly early on that it is only so she can serve the functions traditionally assigned to females; procreation, inspiration, being disbelieved/exploited/dismissed. It gives a pretty unambiguous idea of what a woman’s purpose is perceived to be.
Disappointing, but certainly an improvement on the original.
Foe is a consciously literary novel. The first section is exquisitely rendered, but as soon as the metafiction really kicks in, I found it obtrusive. The exploration of the blurred lines between fiction and reality, power and language, Friday’s story and the notion of double consciousness (and of being a stranger everywhere, even his own homeland, were he to return) is fascinating – it’s a shame the narrative descends into the pretentious, only to drown in its own artifice. (That ending, though?!)
I disliked the way Coetzee depicted women here. Quite frankly, I wanted to throttle Susan for her subservience, whining and bizarre decisions. Perhaps the worst, however, was the visitations of the muse. (Ugh.) It is interesting that Coetzee chose to introduce a woman into the narrative, but it becomes clear fairly early on that it is only so she can serve the functions traditionally assigned to females; procreation, inspiration, being disbelieved/exploited/dismissed. It gives a pretty unambiguous idea of what a woman’s purpose is perceived to be.
Disappointing, but certainly an improvement on the original.
August 2, 2020
A tricky story of narrative power and silence.
Susan Barton is the third, unknown castaway on Crusoe's island, and her account is quite different, both from Cruso's as rendered here, and from the eventual novel that Daniel Defoe will pen. None of these narratives, as far as I can tell, have much basis in history. Defoe seems to have been inspired by the story of marooned sailor Alexander Selkirk, but his story does not mirror any of the fictional counterparts.
Meanwhile, Friday has been changed from an obedient indigenous man who is reinvented as an English servant into a mutilated African slave of unknowable origins, whose endless, unbreakable silence is the heart of this book. Returned to England, Susan and Friday seek out the celebrated but perpetually bankrupt writer Foe, and attempt to have their story told.
This is a slippery, cerebral book -- sometimes more cerebral than entertaining, but occasionally it shifts into moments of being startlingly, vibrantly alive. It confirms Coetzee as one of my favourite writers who I never seek out but who never fails to impress when he falls into my lap.
Susan Barton is the third, unknown castaway on Crusoe's island, and her account is quite different, both from Cruso's as rendered here, and from the eventual novel that Daniel Defoe will pen. None of these narratives, as far as I can tell, have much basis in history. Defoe seems to have been inspired by the story of marooned sailor Alexander Selkirk, but his story does not mirror any of the fictional counterparts.
Meanwhile, Friday has been changed from an obedient indigenous man who is reinvented as an English servant into a mutilated African slave of unknowable origins, whose endless, unbreakable silence is the heart of this book. Returned to England, Susan and Friday seek out the celebrated but perpetually bankrupt writer Foe, and attempt to have their story told.
This is a slippery, cerebral book -- sometimes more cerebral than entertaining, but occasionally it shifts into moments of being startlingly, vibrantly alive. It confirms Coetzee as one of my favourite writers who I never seek out but who never fails to impress when he falls into my lap.
October 11, 2012
This review will overflow with cliché. Such is the sum of my experience. Fox is a meditation on silence. Coetzee explores the natural aspects of such. The sea and wilderness yield no ready wisdom. Such doesn’t communicate in our jejune terms.
There is also an algebra of silence by design. It is a poetry of omissions. It is the fruit of doubt and a coveted rank of humility. The narrative currents of our lives are larded with the silence, we adorn them with caprice and detail. Coetzee intervenes into what understand as a novelistic tradition, a landmark to judge our way. He ruminates and consider alternatives. This disorients and we may grow uneasy. As matters coalesce, he neglects close, only a hum and the whisper of the surf remain.
There is also an algebra of silence by design. It is a poetry of omissions. It is the fruit of doubt and a coveted rank of humility. The narrative currents of our lives are larded with the silence, we adorn them with caprice and detail. Coetzee intervenes into what understand as a novelistic tradition, a landmark to judge our way. He ruminates and consider alternatives. This disorients and we may grow uneasy. As matters coalesce, he neglects close, only a hum and the whisper of the surf remain.
May 1, 2008
Ugh. I really was enthralled with the idea of this novel, but obviously I'm not post-modern enough to enjoy this sort of book. Coetzee's narrator really irritated me and I absolutely did not buy her POV as being a woman's. Some male authors can do a credible female narrator, but I think this Nobel laureate should stay inside his own gender!
February 17, 2017
O perspectivă interesantă asupra romanului Robinson Crusoe narată de o femeie naufragiată pe aceeași insulă. Multă critică socială, fragmente epistolare, final deschis - există, până la urmă, destule elemente care să motiveze lectura, dar parcă ar lipsi ceva.
October 1, 2016
ترجمه ي ونداد جليلي چندان دلچسب نبود و ديگر اينكه رمان بيش از اندازه درونگرا و پر استعاره است و به گمانم خواننده ي انگليسي زبان بسيار ازش لذت خواهد برد تا خواننده ي ترجمه هاي دم دستي خوان ِ پارسي
August 16, 2019
“Quando rifletto sulla mia storia, mi pare di esistere solo come colei che è giunta, colei che è stata testimone, colei che anelava ad andarsene: un essere senza consistenza, un fantasma accanto al corpo vero di Cruso. È dunque questo il destino di chi narra storie?”
Non Crusoe, ma Susan Barton, naufragata nell’isola più celebre della letteratura, che testimonia la testardaggine e la musoneria di Cruso, il naufrago per eccellenza, che però non possiede nemmeno una delle qualità tanto decantate da Defoe, simboli dell’intraprendenza, del buonsenso borghese e dell’ottimismo di un’epoca.
Ma Coetzee riscrive la storia con una lucida consapevolezza postcolonialista e in un’ottica postmoderna.
Perciò il libro è difficile, a tratti astruso, di certo meditativo, filosofico e metaletterario.
Una donna ha bisogno di un uomo (lo scrittore Foe, decurtato del prefisso nobiliare) per trasformare la sua storia in scrittura e farne un prodotto appetibile per un mercato di lettori avidi di ingredienti stimolanti e colpi di scena esagerati. Niente di tutto questo invece: c’è la storia di una donna che tenta invano di comunicare con uomo chiuso in se stesso e insieme la storia di uno schiavo nero (Venerdì) a cui è stata mozzata la lingua: muto, mutilato e reietto si esprime in un linguaggio di gesti e di musica, solipsistico e incomprensibile al mondo.
Al centro del discorso il mistero della scrittura narrativa, strumento ambiguo e potente, falsificazione necessaria per dare voce a uno stralcio di verità. O forse soltanto al suo fantasma.
“ Dimenticavo che siete uno scrittore e dunque sapete quante parole si possono succhiare da un festino di cannibali, e quanto poche da una donna in cerca di un riparo dal vento.”
July 13, 2019
JUNE 2019 - reread
In FOE we witness an author who cheats the cards before our eyes with his innate ability to retell stories, adapt them and give them new meaning. Coetzee challenged one of the most widely published books in history, Daniel DeFoe’s “The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe” by transforming the famed author DeFoe into an antagonist Foe, Crusoe into Cruso (without the e), included a castaway woman, Susan Barton (based on the heroine of DeFoe’s ROXANA) and a mute slave named Friday. Socially constrained by being female in the 18th century, Barton sought Foe, a male author, to chronicle her year on the island with Cruso. Barton and Foe disagree on the nature of writing with Foe pushing for fabrications to give ‘substance’ to Barton’s dull tale.
This is my second time reading Foe and I was drawn to Friday’s character. I appreciated how Coetzee was able to restore agency to Friday’s silence by making both Foe and Barton unable to identify with Friday and at the same time Coetzee chose not to be the one to give Friday a voice because it was not his place as a white South African - considering that Foe was published when apartheid, an era marked by silence, was still ongoing.
The words story/stories is used a total of 137 in this 156 page book and true/truth/truly is used 97 times. Coetzee does not only want us to think about the art of storytelling but he also forces the reader to ask questions than to provide us with answers: who has the authorial control for telling stories? does silence mean there are no stories to be told? how does language misinform? what is the relationship between language and self? can silence be a form of resistance to oppressive power? what memories do we rely on for truth? how are authors influenced by their personal circumstances and culture in the writing of stories? And maybe the greatest gift this little miracle of a book gives us is the encouragement to question history itself. FOE is both a middle finger to postcolonial narratives and a really enjoyable lecture in creative writing.
Mar 2018
It’s taken me a while to pen down my thoughts on this brilliant retelling of Daniel Defoe’s ‘Robinson Crusoe’ mostly because Coetzee packed in so much in such a slim book that I’m still mulling over the subtleties. Is it a homage to Defoe, considered as the ‘father of fiction’ or is it a parody to the classical tale of colonialism and imperialism? I’m swinging towards the latter. Coetzee deliberately opposed Defoe’s hero with a heroine and included Daniel Foe as the antagonist who took Susan Barton’s story and wrote her out of it - effectively reducing her to a muse and giving life to the famous story of Robinson Crusoe. It made me question who’s narrative I could trust, Defoe’s or Coetzee. And it also made me question what liberties an author can take. The writing is exquisite, the characters dream like and it’s overall a very clever book. The pettiness in me was howling at how Coetzee stripped off Defoe’s nobility by eliminating the prefix ‘De’ in his antagonist’s name 😂. I’m not a big fan of retellings but I’m digging the idea of authors responding to each other and carrying on the dialogue centuries later. This is a masterpiece.
In FOE we witness an author who cheats the cards before our eyes with his innate ability to retell stories, adapt them and give them new meaning. Coetzee challenged one of the most widely published books in history, Daniel DeFoe’s “The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe” by transforming the famed author DeFoe into an antagonist Foe, Crusoe into Cruso (without the e), included a castaway woman, Susan Barton (based on the heroine of DeFoe’s ROXANA) and a mute slave named Friday. Socially constrained by being female in the 18th century, Barton sought Foe, a male author, to chronicle her year on the island with Cruso. Barton and Foe disagree on the nature of writing with Foe pushing for fabrications to give ‘substance’ to Barton’s dull tale.
This is my second time reading Foe and I was drawn to Friday’s character. I appreciated how Coetzee was able to restore agency to Friday’s silence by making both Foe and Barton unable to identify with Friday and at the same time Coetzee chose not to be the one to give Friday a voice because it was not his place as a white South African - considering that Foe was published when apartheid, an era marked by silence, was still ongoing.
The words story/stories is used a total of 137 in this 156 page book and true/truth/truly is used 97 times. Coetzee does not only want us to think about the art of storytelling but he also forces the reader to ask questions than to provide us with answers: who has the authorial control for telling stories? does silence mean there are no stories to be told? how does language misinform? what is the relationship between language and self? can silence be a form of resistance to oppressive power? what memories do we rely on for truth? how are authors influenced by their personal circumstances and culture in the writing of stories? And maybe the greatest gift this little miracle of a book gives us is the encouragement to question history itself. FOE is both a middle finger to postcolonial narratives and a really enjoyable lecture in creative writing.
Mar 2018
It’s taken me a while to pen down my thoughts on this brilliant retelling of Daniel Defoe’s ‘Robinson Crusoe’ mostly because Coetzee packed in so much in such a slim book that I’m still mulling over the subtleties. Is it a homage to Defoe, considered as the ‘father of fiction’ or is it a parody to the classical tale of colonialism and imperialism? I’m swinging towards the latter. Coetzee deliberately opposed Defoe’s hero with a heroine and included Daniel Foe as the antagonist who took Susan Barton’s story and wrote her out of it - effectively reducing her to a muse and giving life to the famous story of Robinson Crusoe. It made me question who’s narrative I could trust, Defoe’s or Coetzee. And it also made me question what liberties an author can take. The writing is exquisite, the characters dream like and it’s overall a very clever book. The pettiness in me was howling at how Coetzee stripped off Defoe’s nobility by eliminating the prefix ‘De’ in his antagonist’s name 😂. I’m not a big fan of retellings but I’m digging the idea of authors responding to each other and carrying on the dialogue centuries later. This is a masterpiece.
December 9, 2018
Μια κυριολεκτική διαστρέβλωση του τίτλου από τον εκδότη και μια μεταφορική διαστρέβλωση του μύθου από τον συγγραφέα! Γίνονται και θαύματα.
https://pepperlines.blogspot.com/2018...
Υ.Γ. 4.5 *
https://pepperlines.blogspot.com/2018...
Υ.Γ. 4.5 *
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