On Public and Private in J. M. Coetzee

Bibliographic Data

ID7739615
AuthorsRita Barnard (corresponding author)
Year2013
Volume27
Issue3
Pages438-461
Publication date2013-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueCultural Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0950-2386 • E-ISSN: 1466-4348
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/09502386.2013.769149
OpenAlexW2122264373
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited14

This essay reads J. M. Coetzee's Diary of a Bad Year in its historical context (the moment of the US war in Iraq, Abu Graib, Guantanamo and the apparent triumph of neoliberalism), while also probing the problems at stake in the practice of contextual reading and of taking the work as staging the opinions of the biographical Coetzee. The essay teases out not only the question of whether Coetzee should be seen as a public intellectual (the short but not entirely satisfactory answer is ‘no’), but also how the terms ‘public’ and ‘private’ play out in his oeuvre and are helpful in pondering Coetzee's approach to questions of genre, censorship and authorship

Art · Censorship · Context (archaeology · Literature · Media studies · Neoliberalism (international relations · Political economy · Political science · Reading (process · Sociology · African Sexualities and LGBTQ+ Issues · History · Law · Legal Issues in South Africa · South African History and Culture

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub