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Notes
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Includes a section on Coetzee's novel, Elizabeth Costello.
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
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The Creature-Feeling as Secular Grace : On the Religious in J.M. Coetzee’s Fiction
2018
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Literature and Theology , March vol. 32 no. 1 2018; (p. 69–86)'In this article, I argue that the epiphanies in J.M. Coetzee’s fiction can be read as literary enactments of the ‘creature-feeling’, a feeling of absolute dependence on one’s creatureliness that was first described by the theologian Rudolf Otto. I begin with a discussion of the creature-feeling with reference to William James’ The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902) and Rudolf Otto’s The Idea of the Holy (1917). Critics have observed that Coetzee’s fictions suggest shared embodiment as the basis for humans’ ethical responsibility towards other humans and towards animals, and have focussed on Emmanuel Lévinas when addressing theological influences on Coetzee’s non-rational ethics. Bringing James and Otto into the discussion allows me to account for those epiphanic moments in Coetzee that do not overlap with the ethical or the aesthetic, moments in which characters experience what I call secular grace. Coetzee is not the first to enact the creature-feeling: he reworks earlier enactments by James Joyce.' (Publication abstract)
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The ‘Hermeneutics of Equivocation’ in JM Coetzee’s Elizabeth Costello
2012
single work
criticism
— Appears in: JASAL , vol. 12 no. 1 2012; 'Much has been made of the purported insignificance of the postscript that appends JM Coetzee's eleventh novel, Elizabeth Costello. In J.M. Coetzee's Austerities, Graham Bradshaw writes that 'Apart from some searching pages in an essay by Lucy Graham on "Textual Transvestism", Coetzee's "Letter" has barely been discussed, and when it became the "Postscript" to Elizabeth Costello one reviewer complained that it had no connection with that work'. In "The Subject and Infinity", the French philosopher Alain Badiou re-evaluates Jacques Lacan's notorious formulas of sexuation to argue that 'Lacan only summons the infinite to dismiss it.' What Badiou wants to do then is give 'full recognition to the existence of the infinite' and to insist that 'the infinite of inaccessibility is not adequate. What must be discovered is the affirmative force of the infinite, which is always lodged in some axiomatic decision' (227). This essay argues that the reader needs to axiomatically decide to further investigate the seemingly nonsensical inclusion of the Postscript in Coetzee's Elizabeth Costello, in order to encounter this affirmative force.' (Author's abstract)
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Boundary Trouble : Trauma Fiction and Postcolonialism in Tim Winton's The Turning
2012
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Border Crossings : Narrative and Demarcation in Postcolonial Literatures and Media 2012; (p. 33-44) Victoria Kuttained traces the interconnections between trauma and postcolonialism in Tim Winton's The Turning - a collection of seventeen interrelated short stories. -
Coetzee in Context : Critical Approaches to the Work of J. M. Coetzee
2006
single work
review
— Appears in: Journal of Commonwealth and Postcolonial Studies , Spring vol. 13 no. 1 2006; (p. 57-64)
— Review of J.M. Coetzee and the Ethics of Reading : Literature in the Event 2004 multi chapter work criticism ; Cosmopolitan Fictions : Ethics, Politics and Global Change in the Works of Ishiguro, Ondaatje, Kincaid and Coetzee 2006 single work criticism ; Old Myths - Modern Empires: Power, Language, and Identity in J.M. Coetzee's Work 2005 single work criticism ; J. M Coetzee and the Idea of the Public Intellectual 2006 single work criticism ; A Universe of (Hi)Stories : Essays on J. M. Coetzee 2006 anthology criticism ; Postcolonial Narrative and the Work of Mourning : J. M. Coetzee, Wilson Harris, and Toni Morrison 2004 single work criticism ; Writing in Crisis : Ethics and History in Gordimer, Ndebele and Coetzee 2004 single work criticism -
Untitled
2005
single work
review
— Appears in: Journal of Postcolonial Writing , November vol. 41 no. 2 2005; (p. 240-242)
— Review of J.M. Coetzee and the Ethics of Reading : Literature in the Event 2004 multi chapter work criticism
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Reading the Other
2005
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Humanities Review , July no. 36 2005;
— Review of J.M. Coetzee and the Ethics of Reading : Literature in the Event 2004 multi chapter work criticism -
Untitled
2005
single work
review
— Appears in: Journal of Postcolonial Writing , November vol. 41 no. 2 2005; (p. 240-242)
— Review of J.M. Coetzee and the Ethics of Reading : Literature in the Event 2004 multi chapter work criticism -
Coetzee in Context : Critical Approaches to the Work of J. M. Coetzee
2006
single work
review
— Appears in: Journal of Commonwealth and Postcolonial Studies , Spring vol. 13 no. 1 2006; (p. 57-64)
— Review of J.M. Coetzee and the Ethics of Reading : Literature in the Event 2004 multi chapter work criticism ; Cosmopolitan Fictions : Ethics, Politics and Global Change in the Works of Ishiguro, Ondaatje, Kincaid and Coetzee 2006 single work criticism ; Old Myths - Modern Empires: Power, Language, and Identity in J.M. Coetzee's Work 2005 single work criticism ; J. M Coetzee and the Idea of the Public Intellectual 2006 single work criticism ; A Universe of (Hi)Stories : Essays on J. M. Coetzee 2006 anthology criticism ; Postcolonial Narrative and the Work of Mourning : J. M. Coetzee, Wilson Harris, and Toni Morrison 2004 single work criticism ; Writing in Crisis : Ethics and History in Gordimer, Ndebele and Coetzee 2004 single work criticism -
Boundary Trouble : Trauma Fiction and Postcolonialism in Tim Winton's The Turning
2012
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Border Crossings : Narrative and Demarcation in Postcolonial Literatures and Media 2012; (p. 33-44) Victoria Kuttained traces the interconnections between trauma and postcolonialism in Tim Winton's The Turning - a collection of seventeen interrelated short stories. -
The ‘Hermeneutics of Equivocation’ in JM Coetzee’s Elizabeth Costello
2012
single work
criticism
— Appears in: JASAL , vol. 12 no. 1 2012; 'Much has been made of the purported insignificance of the postscript that appends JM Coetzee's eleventh novel, Elizabeth Costello. In J.M. Coetzee's Austerities, Graham Bradshaw writes that 'Apart from some searching pages in an essay by Lucy Graham on "Textual Transvestism", Coetzee's "Letter" has barely been discussed, and when it became the "Postscript" to Elizabeth Costello one reviewer complained that it had no connection with that work'. In "The Subject and Infinity", the French philosopher Alain Badiou re-evaluates Jacques Lacan's notorious formulas of sexuation to argue that 'Lacan only summons the infinite to dismiss it.' What Badiou wants to do then is give 'full recognition to the existence of the infinite' and to insist that 'the infinite of inaccessibility is not adequate. What must be discovered is the affirmative force of the infinite, which is always lodged in some axiomatic decision' (227). This essay argues that the reader needs to axiomatically decide to further investigate the seemingly nonsensical inclusion of the Postscript in Coetzee's Elizabeth Costello, in order to encounter this affirmative force.' (Author's abstract)
-
The Creature-Feeling as Secular Grace : On the Religious in J.M. Coetzee’s Fiction
2018
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Literature and Theology , March vol. 32 no. 1 2018; (p. 69–86)'In this article, I argue that the epiphanies in J.M. Coetzee’s fiction can be read as literary enactments of the ‘creature-feeling’, a feeling of absolute dependence on one’s creatureliness that was first described by the theologian Rudolf Otto. I begin with a discussion of the creature-feeling with reference to William James’ The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902) and Rudolf Otto’s The Idea of the Holy (1917). Critics have observed that Coetzee’s fictions suggest shared embodiment as the basis for humans’ ethical responsibility towards other humans and towards animals, and have focussed on Emmanuel Lévinas when addressing theological influences on Coetzee’s non-rational ethics. Bringing James and Otto into the discussion allows me to account for those epiphanic moments in Coetzee that do not overlap with the ethical or the aesthetic, moments in which characters experience what I call secular grace. Coetzee is not the first to enact the creature-feeling: he reworks earlier enactments by James Joyce.' (Publication abstract)