As he gets older he finds himself growing more and more crabby about language, about slack usage, falling standards. Falling in love, for instance. 'We fell in love with the house', friends of his say. How can you fall in love with a house when the house cannot love you back, he wants to reply? Once you start falling in love with objects, what will be left of real love, love as it used to be? But no one seems to care. People fall in love with tapestries, with old cars.
A man contemplates his deep connection to a house.
The unfathomable idea of threshing wheat points to a life lost.
And a writer ponders the creation of his narrator.
Three Stories—'His Man and He', written as Coetzee's acceptance speech for the Nobel Prize for Literature, 'A House in Spain' and 'Nietverloren'—is the work of a master at his peak. These are stories that embody the essence of our existence.
a must-have for Coetzee fans.
Three Stories is a sleek little volume of three previously published short stories by award-winning South African-born writer, J M Coetzee, which showcase his literary talent.
I. A House in Spain (2000) is a reflection on the parallels between marriage and owning a house. The man who has bought for himself a house in Spain find his attitude altering from scorn for people who profess to falling in love with a house, to feeling something akin to just that for the old homestead on which he begins to lavish attention.
II. Nietverloren (2002) is a lament on the loss of the traditional use of the South African farmland for a crop of a very different kind.
III. He and His Man (2003) imagines the life of Robinson Crusoe and his man Friday on their return to England, as Robin lives vicariously on the travels Friday undertakes. This is an interesting exercise although Coetzee places them there during the Plague, which does clash with the Defoe book.
With these short stories, Coetzee proves he is the master of powerful prose on thought-provoking topics. The stories are those of a great novelist at his peak, and this volume will be a must-have for Coetzee fans.
Marianne, 21/12/2014
