J. M. Coetzee and the Ethics of Narrative Transgression

This book is about the metanarrative and metafictional elements of J. M. Coetzees novels. It draws together authorship, readership, ethics, and formal analysis into one overarching argument about how narratives work the boundary between art and life. On the basis of Coetzees writing, it reconsiders the concept of metalepsis, challenges common understandings of self-reflexive discourse, and invites us to rethink our practice as critics and readers. This study analyzes Coetzees novels in three chapters organized thematically around the authors relation with character, reader, and self. Author and character are discussed on the basis of Foe, Slow Man, and Coetzees Nobel lecture, 'He and His Man'. Stories featuring the character Elizabeth Costello, or the figuration Elizabeth Curren, serve to elaborate the relation of author and reader. The study ends on a reading of Summertime, Diary of a Bad Year, and Dusklands as Coetzees engagement with autobiographical writing, analyzing the relation of author and self. It will appeal to readers with an interest in literary and narrative theory as much as to Coetzee scholars and advanced students.