favourite lit text (second to Howards End). packs a punch in only 4 chapters. it grows on you…like the cancer growing in Mrs Curren’s body. Coetzee is bloody talented at crafting Symbolism and Metaphor in a non-tokenistic way that really serves a purpose in portraying the psyche of the character. In line with the theme of the epistolary novel….He transforms abstract feeling n ideology into words effortlessly.

Tenere in vita un'anima in un tempo che all'anima è ostile

Forse tra quelli letti questo è il Coetzee che scava più a fondo nell'animo umano, miscelando comunque sapientemente fatti storici e sociopolitici come nelle altre sue opere.
Il Sudafrica e gli scontri di Soweto del 76 sono sullo sfondo come in un classico romanzo di denuncia, ma è soprattutto un'opera che parla del cuore dell'uomo, di vita e di morte.
Ad oggi il Coetzee che ho preferito, un romanzo davvero potente.

Comincio solo ora a comprendere il vero significato dell'abbraccio. Si abbraccia per essere abbracciati. Prendiamo i nostri bambini tra le braccia affinché essi ci stringano nell'abbraccio del futuro, ci facciano sopravvivere, ci accompagnino oltre la soglia della morte. Era cosí ogni volta che ti stringevo a me, sempre. Diamo alla luce figli affinché essi si prendano cura di noi.

Primo compito assegnatomi da oggi: resistere al desiderio di condividere il dolore della morte con qualcuno. Poiché amo te e amo la vita devo perdonare i vivi e congedarmi senza rimpianti. Abbracciare la morte come se mi appartenesse, come se fosse solo mia.

Troppe cose da dare: troppe per una che desidera, a dire il vero, rifugiarsi nel grembo della propria madre per trovarvi conforto.

Potremmo formare una famiglia, noi due, in qualche modo. Io di sopra, lui al piano di sotto, per il breve tempo che mi resta. Cosí ci sarebbe qualcuno a farmi compagnia di notte. Poiché, dopo tutto, è di questo che si ha bisogno alla fine: di qualcuno che sia lí, da chiamare nell'oscurità. Madre, o chiunque sia pronto a prendere il posto di nostra madre.

Forse la vergogna è solo l'altro nome di quello che provo da sempre. Il nome della condizione in cui vivono quelle persone che preferirebbero essere morte. Vergogna. Umiliazione. Morte in vita.

Quando la follia ascende al trono, chi in tutto il regno può sfuggire al contagio?

Per non restare paralizzata dalla vergogna ho passato la vita ad andare avanti, sopportando il peggio. Quel che non posso piú sopportare ora è proprio quell'andare avanti. Se vado avanti anche questa volta non avrò mai piú un'altra occasione per non farlo. Se voglio guadagnarmi la resurrezione questa volta non posso andare avanti.

Quello che non avevo calcolato era che molto di piú era richiesto che il solo essere buoni. Perché c'è inflazione di persone buone in questo paese. Ce n'è da vendere, di buoni o quasi buoni. Quello che i tempi richiedono è ben altro che la bontà. Questi tempi richiedono eroismo.

Ma non saranno le ali che gli hai assicurato attorno al corpo a garantirgli la vita. La vita è polvere incrostata tra le dita dei piedi. La vita è polvere che scricchiola tra i denti. La vita è mordere la polvere.

Age of Iron is a lament by an elderly classics professor close to her death, not just for her own life and regrets, but for the injustices of the world, and more specifically South Africa under Apartheid. As her death approaches, so too the violence that has always been remote suddenly draws closer, and she finds herself drawn to the conflagration, to see, for once in her life, the true cost of a disastrous policy. On this journey into Inferno, she has something like a guide in the homeless man who has shown up at her door. He rejects her attempts to "help" him, and instead becomes her confidante and helper. Coetzee is a subtle, canny writer, who has both an erudition that underlies the novel, as well as a deep humanity that he never overplays.

Como contagiándose del título, la pluma de Coetzee pierde ligereza y precisión. La contundencia preside esta obra en que una mujer da fe de cómo se muere de cáncer en un país que tal vez también sufre de cáncer y se revuelve contra la parte extraña y tiránica de si mismo. La aceptación del destino personal contrasta con la creciente implicación en la rebelión contra el statu quo de Sudáfrica en los estertores del apartheid. Libre de las convenciones que le ha impuesto la vida, sin amigos ni parientes que le acompañen en su desintegración, la protagonista se ve abocada a confiar en 'el otro', en un extraño.
No me ha maravillado como otras obras de este autor, pero el tono es alto y por momentos consigue llegar a esa fibra que sólo consiguen conmover los grandes.

Cảm giác cả cuốn sách là sự vật lộn, bồi hồi giữa sự sống và cái chết, nỗi thất vọng về cuộc sống cũng như hy vọng về tương lai. Điều lạ kỳ là người đang sắp cập bến cuối của cuộc đời lại là người cuối cùng ở lại, nhìn những thứ đáng lẽ ra phải tràn đầy nhựa sống mất dần đi...

Encontré muy bien lograda la voz de una mujer mayor en esta larga carta de despedida a su hija, unas palabras que esperan poder llegar desde Sudáfrica hasta Estados Unidos después de la muerte, confiando en la palabra de un vagabundo salido de la calle que empieza durmiendo en el garaje de su casa y termina durmiendo a su lado en la cama para cuidarla.

I have been torn while reading J.M. Coetzee's "Age of Iron" (it is the ninth book by this author that I have read) - my reactions ranged from extreme awe to slight irritation. The novel contains so many passages of unparalleled wisdom, depth, and beauty, yet it is marred by a few instances of sermonizing preachiness.

Elizabeth Curren, a professor of classics in Cape Town, South Africa, is in the last stage of terminal cancer. She finds a homeless man, Mr. Vercueil, in the alley next to her garage. With her tacit approval, he kind of takes residence on her property. This is 1986, a dramatic time for South Africa, the time of burning townships and violent clashes between anti-apartheid fighters and the police aided by conservative activists. Mrs. Curren finds her domestic's son shot dead and a friend of his takes refuge in her house. Isolated from the harsh realities throughout her life, she discovers the true horrors of apartheid in her last weeks.

The novel, framed as a long letter to Mrs. Curren's daughter who escaped South Africa in 1976 and settled comfortably in the United States, has four central themes: the psychology of dying, the relationship between Mrs. Curren and the homeless man, the savagery caused by the apartheid system, and the juxtaposition of the wise reason of the old and the mindless fervor of the young.

The first two themes, the personal ones, are dealt with in an absolutely masterful way, typical for Mr. Coetzee. If the novel stopped there, I would need a six-star rating to give it justice. The two latter themes are different. The author vividly portrays the extreme drama of South Africa, yet I have some problems with the "paint-by-numbers" plot. The fourth theme, the young versus the old, emotion versus reason, feeling versus knowing, is largely conveyed through Mrs. Curren's monologues (since her conversation partner does not talk back), which makes the deep truths stated sound a little preachy. Still, Mrs. Curren is a classics professor, and speaking in perfectly complete paragraphs is what classics professors do best.

"Age of Iron" is an extremely dark book, even darker than Mr. Coetzee's other works. The heavy darkness is needed here, though. How else could one deal with impending death and with massive degradation of one's fellow human beings? Yet it is in no way a depressing novel. Mrs. Curren's involvement with anti-apartheid movement moves her thoughts away from the terrifying prospect of soon not existing any more. Helping others adds meaning to her ending life. Also, there is a beautifully captured fleeting moment of hope late in the novel and the last passages, despite death being near, are wonderfully uplifting.

Even with its weaknesses "Age of Iron" is a great book. The average of six stars for the first two themes and three stars for the latter two is

Four and a half stars.

Me ha gustado esta historia de principio a fin.

Es un libro que me mantuvo en un constante dilema moral. Tratando de empatizar con la señora Curren, tratando de entender su dolor, las ausencias de su vida, su soledad su ancianidad.

Vercueil, este personaje al inicio incómodo pero se queda hasta el final para alivianar la soledad.

El contexto es increíblemente duro, muestra las miserias humana, el racismo y la voluntad social.

Increíblemente escrito.

n  n    A lie: charity, caritas, has nothing to do with the heart. But what does it matter if my sermons rest on false etymologies? He barely listens when i speak to him. Perhaps, despite those keen bird-eyes, he is more befuddled with drink than I know. Or perhaps, finally, he does not care. Care: the true root of charity. I look for him to care, and he does not. Because he is beyond caring. Beyond caring and beyond care. n  n

I'm confused about my feeling on this. this. On one hand, I can appreciate the writing, though I don't particularly like the style. The themes tackled are heavy and the book is full of symbolism. However, I'm always kept as arms length by Coetze's narrators. The same thing happened with another book I read by him, I very much disliked the narrator. I'm not sure this is the reaction we're supposed to get in response to these characters. Or is it?

In any case, I had to force myself to finish it because my dislike for Mrs. Curren was overpowering my interest for the issues brought up. I'm reluctant to say I might have even despised her a little. Which is upsetting because technically she was a helpless woman dying from cancer. Yet it was very hard to muster sympathy for her because her reactions, thoughts and feelings felt so forced and unmoving. A former professor, abandoned by her husband, left behind by her daughter who fled to America from apartheid, who ultimately chose not to tell her daughter she was sick because she didn't want to be a burden. She kept getting involved in the lives of a homeless man and her domestic's family who was caught up in the political turmoil and violence of a dying oppressive regime. I didn't feel her involvement was organic however. It felt like she was mimicking compassion and kept wanting to help not because she cared whatsoever, but because she was afraid of being alone. Which is about the only relatable thing I found about her, the fear of dying alone.

I assume her sickness, her cancer was a symbolism for what was happening in South Africa with the apartheid. Are the white Afrikaners the cancer in this analogy or is just the system? Can they even be separated and what is the right way to end it? Mrs. Curren make several remarks that things used to be better in the past, people were more respectful, there was no violence. Was it really better in the past or were the people like Mrs. Curren unable to see from their view of privilege. She seems to be against the horrors of that system yet she feels nostalgic for the days when she was unaware of pain around her and she could live her days peacefully in her ivory tower.

I've been thinking recently of what it is about the books that I like that make them the books that I like. Why is it that I not only like them, but that I can stay with them, re-read them even in the same sitting, have them hanging around like a friend, live with them. They create their own space and time, a whole world, but it's not the setting of the book that I want to be in (in this case, 1980s South Africa; in Bernhard's case, some cold mountain side in Austria). It's not the characters (God forbid that they be "relatable" and "authentic"). And it's not necessarily the words either ("this rope of words", p197), the way they're weaved, because the same effect is there in translation. I usually unabashedly describe this effect as "magic". But what could it be that creates this magic? Maybe Coetzee the photographer has given us a hint here. Could it be the storyteller's frame? The sight (and non-sight) that it provides, the focus (and unfocus), a vision of the the very soul of the thing, stolen as in a photograph. "[T]he storyteller...claims the place of right. It is through my eyes that you see." (p103) What do you see? What happens when you see something you didn't want to see? (c.f. Waiting for the Barbarians). "We were photographed...in a garden...Who clipped the hollyhocks? Who laid the melon seeds...? [W]hose was the garden...? Who are the ghosts and who the presences? No longer does the picture show who were in the garden frame...but who were not there." (p111) What are we missing as we live our ordinary lives? "He is like one of those half-mythical creatures that come out in photographs only as blurs...Or disappearing over the edge of the picture..." (p193). This is the story of a soul, all the best literature is. The story of that thing we don't see -- as we live in "the unknown, in the future, like a shadow cast before" (p170) us -- but is there.

Existe algo na escrita de Coetzee que me atrai e que faz com que me sinta sugado para dentro do mundo descrito nas suas páginas de cada vez que recomeço a sua leitura. Não há nada de muito especial em termos de narrativa ou de personagens, é mesmo o mundo criado e representado, com o Apartheid por detrás, que atrai toda a minha atenção e me faz seguir com enorme curiosidade a cuidada descrição de Coetzee.

Neste livro seguimos uma professora universitária reformada que se envolve com um sem abrigo que vem parar à sua rua e com os filhos da sua empregada doméstica. Nesse envolvimento, dá-se conta de uma revolta que acontece nas escolas do país e depois do modo como a polícia lida com o assunto.

Passa-se muito pouco à superfície, mas é no trabalho realizado por nós de completar tudo com o conhecimento do regime político da África do Sul que tudo ganha grande envolvência, fazendo com que, enquanto o lia, sentisse ansiedade por voltar continuamente àquele pequeno espaço mental criado pelo livro.

4.5/5

https://narrativax.blogspot.com/2024/...

A bit cold and shocking. But i guess those are characteristics of apartheit.