The Life and Times of Michael K | J.M. Coetzee | A tale at once subsumed by race and yet never...

The Life and Times of Michael K | J.M. Coetzee | A masterpiece of the oppressed human condition

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The Life and Times...

	The Life and Times of Michael K J.M. Coetzee Vintage Books, 2005 - 192 pages average customer review:based on 46 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

In a South Africa torn by civil war, Michael K sets out to take his mother back to her rural home. On the way there she dies, leaving him alone in an anarchic world of brutal roving armies. Imprisoned, Michael is unable to bear confinement and escapes, determined to live with dignity. Life and Times of Michael K goes to the centre of human experience -- the need for an interior, spiritual life, for some connections to the world in which we live, and for purity of vision.

A tale at once subsumed by race and yet never mentioning it

Literary historians credit much of Ireland's rich literary tradition to its often tragic history. No surprise then that the nation of South Africa, likewise so rich in grief that it might as well diamonds, has produced so many extraordinary writers, two of whom, Coetzee included, who can boast a Nobel Prize. Which brings us to one of his many fine novels, the Life and Times of Michael K.

Telling the tale of a black man caught in the twisted and violent web of Apartheid might appear at first an obvious tale, but then again, so might the story of a child who turned to crime in London in the 19th century or one of a boy and his friend journeying down the Mississippi. It is in this vein which one must see The Life and Times of Michael K, one which captures a place and an age. Other reviewers have focused on the tale of the central character, Michael K, so I would instead look at another aspect of the novel. Despite writing about a place and a story where race surrounds every character and facet like smog, Coetzee never once tells us anyone's race. At first I found this strange, discerning it in its broad aspects but finding the absence the stated fact more than a little strange. It was then that a south African friend explained to me that while I could tell only the characters' races in the broadest sense, she could tell it easily, immediately, and down to which subgroup each belonged. Indeed, like an Englishman knowing the class of a countrymen by their accent, she knew this based on job, dress, and dialogue.

This then is to me part of the genius of Coetzee's novel, giving his reader a story that is at once subsumed by race and yet never mentioning it. True, as some complain, Michael K does not grow to a character larger than life, becoming some hero; no he is a simple man, living to the best of his common ability in a world where evil is so common that it deserves no mention.

I would be remiss not to mention Coetzee's gift for prose, his ability to distill a scene or a feeling down to a few words, like grain alcohol. Many Americans remain unfortunately ignorant of this writer and his country's other extraordinary authors, like Freed and Gordimer. This is a tragedy, which I urge every reader to correct.

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A masterpiece of the oppressed human condition

"Michael K" is not your grandma's South African novel. It would be expected that this book would discuss the oppression of Apartheid, but it goes above and beyond this by capturing the essence, in a most unwilling and unaware character, of the human spirit's ability to survive on practically nothing but its own sheer will. Michael K is an oppressed character under the Apartheid regime, yet the politics of the country are only vaguely referenced here in various facilities Michael visits and people he meets; instead, we are led to see the oppression of colonialism more through the way in which Michael views himself and his environment. Michael absolutely cannot catch a break; amidst his mother's death, imprisonment, sickness, homelessness, and continuous battles with starvation, he becomes an opponent to Apartheid in the way he simply continues to live. What becomes apparent as the story develops is Michael's connection with the land; to him, the land embodies his freedom and his utter humanness, his "return to nature," yet this land, in its pure, untouched form, always alludes him. In fact, under the Apartheid regime, such "free land" does not exist. Michael, even when he is alone, is never free. But it does not occur to him to despair in the futility of that realization, which leads others as well as Michael K himself to label him a "simpleton." There is an irony here, then, that the simple-minded are the survivors; in this light, Michael K does not seem so simple at all, but rather among the ranks of genius. But what truly resonated with me in this story is the idea of the unshakable human faith in survival. In this way the book concludes in an almost spiritual metaphor that, if you simply have a teaspoon and a string, you can drink water from a well.

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un shock

este libro me re shockeó. me impactó mucho el punto de vista del protagonista, que me llevó de paseo por lugares que me eran desconocidos. me impresionó cómo está contada la historia, con un lenguaje crudo, llano, visceral, contundente, pero sin golpes bajos. también me impresionó la falta de piedad del autor con su personaje. y el grado de verosimilitud que logra siendo que le pasan tantas cosas que uno podría decir "no puede ser". pero es. y es y es y uno no puede parar de leer. la dimensión histórica del libro también me flasheó. hacía mucho que no leía algo que me shokeara tanto. un libro que enhebra el contexto social con la problemática del protagonista de una manera tan radical y al mismo tiempo, lo lleva de una manera que nos obliga a repensar un montón de cosas que suelen darse por sentadas. lo terminé de leer hoy y aún estoy impactada.

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A novel you won't forget

People just will not let you live a way of life they don't understand. Michael K, misunderstood by just about everybody, finds out in this dark but beautiful novel. Coetzee describes the struggle of someone who, being neither smart or beautiful, finds it impossible to withdraw from the world. Michael is a simple man with a hare lip who wants to be left alone and live life on his own terms. However, in the war-torn South Africa through which he ends up journeying, no hiding place is secure from bullying war fractions or unwanted beneficiaries.
The style is strong, plain, dark and very efficient in picking the right details to make any situation come to life. For all his faults, I was able to relate to Michael and suffer with him. And even though there was a lot of suffering, the book didn't depress me. I still don't know why.
The only pity is that the author added part 2 with the external viewpoint (at least I do not understand the purpose). It gives us interpretations that we can perfectly make ourselves, and a certain baroqueness - that is so pleasantly absent in the rest of the book- creeps into the prose. Otherwise a beautiful book on a great theme.

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