![]() First edition | |
Author | J. M. Coetzee |
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Language | English |
Publisher | Secker & Warburg |
Publication date | 1 September 2005 |
Publication place | Australia |
Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
Pages | 272pp (UK hardback) |
ISBN | 0-436-20611-0 |
OCLC | 61431359 |
Slow Man is a novel by the South-African writer J.M. Coetzee and concerns a man who must learn to adapt after losing a leg in a road accident. The novel has many varied themes, including the nature of care, the relationship between an author and his characters, and man's drive to leave a legacy. It was Coetzee's first novel since winning the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2003. The novel was longlisted for the 2005 Man Booker Prize. [1]
Paul Rayment, a man of late middle-age, loses part of a leg after his bicycle is hit by a car driven by a reckless young man. He becomes reclusive and retreats to his flat where he is cared for by a succession of nurses. None suit him until Marijana, with whom he shares a European childhood (hers in Croatia, his in France), comes along. Paul's feelings for Marijana, and for her teenage son Drago, become more complex. When Paul offers to finance Drago's education, Marijana's husband becomes suspicious of Paul's relationship with Marijana, which causes trouble in their family and culminates in Drago fighting with his father and moving in with Paul.
It is not until the famed author Elizabeth Costello shows up unexpectedly and uninvited at Paul's doorstep that he confronts his feelings for Marijana and his resentment at the state of his life following his bicycle accident. Costello's sudden presence in his life confounds Paul, who believes she is merely using him as a character in her next novel.
The book can be read as a metafictional discourse on the inter-relationship between the literary author and the characters, and with reality.
Slow Man , an operatic adaption of Slow Man by the composer Nicholas Lens, in close co-operation with Coetzee who wrote the libretto, had its world premiere on 5 July 2012 by the Malta Festival 2012 in Poznań, with the Opera Poznań Grand Theatre Wielki. [2] [3]
It was generally well-received. On Metacritic, the book received a 66 out of 100 based on 20 critic reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". [4] The Bookseller reported on reviews from several publications with a rating scale for the novel out of "Top form", "Flawed but worth a read", and "Disappointing": Daily Mail review under "Top form" and Independent , Sunday Telegraph , Daily Telegraph , Financial Times , and Times reviews under "Flawed but worth a read". [5] In the January/February 2006 issue of Bookmarks , the book received a (1.5 out of 5) with the critical summary stating, "Simply, Coetzee’s postmodern literary trick overwhelms what could have been a provoking rumination on love, old age, and life". [6] Globally, Complete Review saying on the consensus "No consensus, with quite a few quite disappointed". [7]
The Booker Prize, formerly the Booker Prize for Fiction (1969–2001) and the Man Booker Prize (2002–2019), is a prestigious literary award conferred each year for the best single work of sustained fiction written in the English language, which was published in the United Kingdom or Ireland. The winner of the Booker Prize receives £50,000, as well as international publicity that usually leads to a significant sales boost. When the prize was created, only novels written by Commonwealth, Irish, and South African citizens were eligible to receive the prize; in 2014, eligibility was widened to any English-language novel—a change that proved controversial.
John Maxwell Coetzee FRSL OMG is a South African and Australian novelist, essayist, linguist, translator and recipient of the 2003 Nobel Prize in Literature. He is one of the most critically acclaimed and decorated authors in the English language. He has won the Booker Prize (twice), the CNA Literary Award (thrice), the Jerusalem Prize, the Prix Femina étranger, and The Irish Times International Fiction Prize, and holds a number of other awards and honorary doctorates.
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