J.M. Coetzee and the Paradox of Postcolonial Authorship

Illuminating J.M. Coetzee's preoccupation, from Dusklands to Diary of a Bad Year, with the paradox of postcolonial authorship centering on the authority authorship engenders, Jane Poyner examines Coetzee's line of author-narrators to trace how he rehearses and revises his understanding of intellectual practice at a time of seismic change in South Africa. Her theoretically sophisticated and accessibly written book is a major contribution to our understanding of the Nobel Laureate and to postcolonial studies.