Booker prize winner 1999, Nobel Prize for Literature winner 2003.
Okay prizes don’t usually attract me to a book. I was burned by reading Voss by Patrick White (Nobel Prize for Literature 1973) – oh it was interminable.
However, after reading To Kill A Mockingbird (finally) I’ve been encouraged to give prize winning authors* another chance…
The other thing that put me off was the cover frankly. It looked miserable. Some moth-eaten bitser in a dusty yard.
And lets face it the back is hardly inspiring – some toe-rag professor does the funky wild thing with a student and is forced to leave (and so he should be) – I mean – how am I supposed to sympathise with my “hero”? Anyway, he lands on his lesbian daughter’s doorstep and she takes him in. The story continues.
On the plus side, I had heard it was good. And Groover liked it, but found it confronting.
So when I saw it on the returns trolley I thought – what the hey – one can’t only take Janet Evanovich books home – it’s not a good look. I needs me some kulcha.
It’s surprisingly easy to get into. It starts with the professor’s relationship with a prostitute and despite myself I was drawn into his story. Then the relationship with the student starts and I just wanted to slap him – what a pathetic nob. And I guess that my reaction means that the writing works – no?
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So he’s kicked out (this is all on the back cover so not giving away any secrets yet) and so he should be and disappears to this farm that his daughter runs – living alone.
I found this book to be yes – confronting – especially about the dangers of being a white woman living in South Africa and the attitudes to the ongoing rape and violence. The comparison with his sexual transgressions with what happens to him and his daughter are interesting. Her reaction in particular confounded me.
It’s not a pleasant journey – but it is one that you will carry with you, and every time you see South Africa mentioned you will think of his daughter, alone on the farm, and her relationships with her neighbours. I’m not sure you will think of Professor David Laurie though.
If I was to note one annoyance – I didn’t like “high literature” parts about his operetta – I couldn’t quite get a handle on that and felt it distracted from the story. Yes, yes, I know he is supposed to be a literature professor – to me it felt like showing off. Then again, maybe that’s all he had left in the end?
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*Oh and I hate to be the radical feminist – but only 11/104 literature Nobel laureates have been women.