Summary

David Lurie, a fifty two year old divorcee, was once a Professor of Modern Languages at Cape Town University but with the change of the times and administration, he is now Adjunct Professor of Communication. He is also limited in the courses he offers. Other than the mandatory Communication 101 and 201, he is allowed to offer only one elective or special-field course. This year he offers a course on Romantic poets. Lurie is apathetic toward the material he teaches and rarely engages his students. He no longer teachers out of passion or conviction but only to make a living. Over the past twenty-five years the professor has published three scholarly books on opera, the erotic nature of Richard of St. Victor's revelations, and Wordsworth's influence on history. Yet, his true desire is to write a chamber opera about love entitled Byron in Italy.

Every Thursday Lurie travels to a prominent gated community, enters a well-furnished apartment, and sleeps with Soraya, a prostitute that he chose from a catalogue at Discrete Escorts under the category of exotic. After Lurie unexpectedly sees Soraya in public with her children, Lurie becomes distracted during their lovemaking. Perhaps because she senses the awkwardness, Soraya announces that her mother is ill and so she can no longer see him. Lurie tries another prostitute also named "Soraya" but she is young and inexperienced. Having grown bored, he sleeps with a married secretary, Dawn; her enthusiasm in bed repels him and he makes sure to avoid her at work. Frustrated and even briefly but not seriously considering castration, Lurie calls Soraya at her home. She is horrified and demands that he never call her house. His response to her reaction is a cool observation, "What should a predator expect when he intrudes into the vixen's nest, into the home of her cubs?(10)."

Without his Thursdays with Soraya, Lurie is terribly bored until he spots a young student in his Romantics course. Melanie Isaacs is thin with dark eyes and hair and broad cheekbones. He first sees her by the college gardens and invites her to his house for a drink. Melanie is not an exceptional student and does not share his passion for Wordsworth or literature; she is a theater major and hopes to have a career in stagecraft and design. After dinner and a movie, Melanie inquires whether or not he is married. He replies he has been married twice and then proceeds to invite her to sleep with him. When she asks why. Lurie responds, "Because a woman's beauty does not belong to her alone. It is part of the bounty she brings into the world. She has a duty to share it (16)." She seems to be momentarily intrigued until he quotes Shakespeare. Melanie is turned off and makes an excuse to leave.

Instead of withdrawing his advances, Lurie pursues her more intensely. He looks into her records at the university to obtain her home address and telephone number, which he uses to invite her to lunch. Taken aback, she agrees but is clearly uncomfortable throughout the lunch date, not eating or talking much. They return to his house and have sex. She is passive throughout the act but he finds the act pleasurable and passes out on top of her. As soon as he awakes, she makes an excuse to leave. When Melanie comes to class the next day Wednesday, Lurie lectures on Wordsworth's Prelude. Melanie looks up from her book for the first time just as he is re-envisioning their sexual encounter; she at once understands and looks down.

Lurie continues his predatory behavior. He secretly watches her at a play rehearsal where Melanie is playing a hairdresser. The next afternoon, he goes to her apartment unannounced. He carries her to the bedroom even though she says that she doesn't want to have sex. Lurie says, "She does not resist. All she does is avert herself: avert her lips, avert her eye(25)." When it is over she asks him to leave because her cousin Pauline will be back soon. He watches her from his car and sees her immediately take a bath.

Melanie does not come to class for an entire week. She misses her mid-term and Lurie falsifies her record, giving her a C until she retakes the test. Sunday night, the next week, Melanie arrives at his door tired and disturbed, wanting a place to stay. He prepares his daughter's old room for her. Initially he is not prepared for the idea but after a little consideration likes the idea of having her available to him on a consistent basis. Yet, he is disturbed when she seems to be using the situation as leverage for her missing so many classes. The narrator says, "But if she has got away with much, he has got away with more; if she is behaving badly, he has behaved worse. To the extent that they are together, he is the one who leads, she the one that follows. Let him not forget that(28)."

They have sex one more time on his daughter's bed. A young man - Melanie's boyfriend - visits Lurie unexpectedly in his office that afternoon. He threatens Lurie with disclosure of the relationship. That night Lurie's car is vandalized and Melanie does not come to his house. Monday, Melanie reappears in class with her boyfriend. Ironically, Lurie scheduled lecture for that day happens to be Byron's "Lara," referencing Lucy. The class is unusually hushed. The boy answers a question about Lucifer with a knowing smirk saying, "He does what he feels like. He doesn't care if it's good or bad. He just does it(33)." After class Lurie speaks to Melanie in his office asking the boy to wait outside. He demands that she come to class more regularly and retake the test, all the while understanding her unspoken protest. When Melanie finally speaks, she does not commit to taking the test she missed and says that she has not read the material.

Analysis

Even though Disgrace is written in third person, David Lurie's language, thoughts and perceptions dominate the text. Every character the reader experiences is filtered through Lurie. Yet access to Lurie's interior does not produce intimacy so much as it reveals his isolation. This is most apparent in his relationships with women. Within the first few chapters of the novel, the reader is introduced in detail to two of Lurie's lovers: Soraya and Melanie. These women vary in age, ethnicity, and education. The only thing they have in common, really, is Lurie-and his inability to connect with them.

Lurie's relationship with Soraya, the prostitute, is founded on money. The novel opens, "For a man of his age, fifty-two, divorced, he has, to his mind, solved the problem of sex rather well (1)." His solution to his problem appears to be clear-cut, without any complications. However, as Lurie describes his relationship, we realize that the reason his relationships are so uncomplicated is that Lurie does not allow them to be. He keeps them strictly superficial. Soraya, for instance, is a complicated Muslim woman. Lurie, however, knows nothing at all about her. He does not know where she lives, whether or not she has children, how old she is, or even what her real name is. When Soraya claims to hate nude beaches and beggars, Lurie does not probe the inherent contradiction between her opinion and her occupation. Moreover, Lurie fails to act on his recognition of the injustice of Soraya's employment at Discreet Escorts. Lurie considers paying Soraya directly, cutting out the Escort service, but he dislikes the possibility of having to see her in the morning.

Lurie's relationship with Soraya epitomizes his brazen disregard for the law, societal rules, or ethics. It is utterly selfish. Therefore, it is not completely surprising when Lurie crosses another boundary and has another wholly selfish sexual relationship with a student. Coetzee suggests that his pursuit of Melanie is predatory in nature. He first sees Melanie in the University gardens, a metaphorically rich location connoting love, desire, and fertility. The garden also resonates with the Bible as the place where Eve was seduced by the serpent. At every turn, Lurie has reason to believe that his advances are inappropriate. He and Melanie don't even share interests. As they watch the Norman McLaren movie, Lurie wants Melanie to be "captivated," yet Melanie watches passively. She is passive, too, during sex. Lurie ignores every indication that Melanie is repulsed by him, instead choosing to interpret her behaviors though his own desires. For instance, when Lurie forces himself on her at her cousin's house, Lurie notices, "She does not resist. All she does is avert herself: avert her lips, avert her eyes...Not rape, not quite that, but undesired nevertheless, undesired to the core (25)." Lurie thus equivocally justifies his action with slippery language. Melanie does not "resist" but rather "averts"; the act is not "rape" but "undesired to the core." He defines his act with his own language, never calling it what it is: rape. Lurie (and the reader along with him) is locked in his own utterly selfish hermeneutic of desire.

Summary

Instead of making up the test, Melanie withdraws from Lurie's class. That same morning, Lurie receives a telephone call from Melanie's father. Unaware of the true nature of Lurie's and Melanie's relationship, Mr. Isaacs asks Lurie to encourage Melanie to stay in school. Reluctanctly, Lurie agrees to talk to Melanie and attempts to phone her at her cousin Pauline's apartment. Pauline does not allow Lurie to talk to her. Attendance in his class that week is poor, and Lurie figures the story must have spread. Melanie's father, a small, thin man from the rural province of George, comes to Lurie's office and says in front of the staff and students,

We put our children in the hands of you people because we think we can trust you. If we can't trust the university. Who can we trust? We never thought we were sending our daughter into a nest of vipers. No, Professor Lurie, you may be high and mighty and have all kinds of degrees, but if I was you I'd be very ashamed of myself(38).

The next morning the Student Affairs offece (Vice-Rector's) contacts Lurie informing him a sexual harassment complaint has been filed against him and includes a copy of the corresponding section of the Code of Conduct he has been accused of violating, Article 3.1: the victimazation or harassment of students by teachers. Lurie is shocked by the notification and refuses to believe that Melanie filed the complaint out of her own will. He imagines a scene in which Pauline forces Melanie to file the complaint. Lurie, after going to the office and signing the complaint, notes, "The deed is done. Two names on the page, his and hers, side by side. Two in a bed, lovers no longer but foes (40)."

When Lurie arrives for his appointment at Aram Hakim's office (the Vice-Rector), his department chair, Elaine Winter, and the university chair, Farodia Rassool, are present. They inform Lurie of the harassment charge and further accuse him of falsifying Melanie's attendance records. Hakim, who unlike Elaine is somewhat sympatheric, advises Lurie to seek legal counsel.

Lurie quickly becomes a pariah. Only two students enroll in Lurie's Baudelaire class the next term. Lurie seeks advice from a lawyer who recommends that Lurie temporarily leave school and enter counseling in exchange for dropped charges. However, Lurie rejects counseling, refusing to exhibit shame for his desires. During a dinner with his ex-wife of eight years, Rosalind, Lurie reveals that he plans to visit his daughter, Lucy, on the Eastern Cape once the term is over. Rosalind brings up the scandal at the university and openly expresses her disapproval. The next day Rosalind informs Lurie of an article that has been written in the local paper, Argus regarding the affair.

The date of the hearing arrives. Melanie, who has submitted her statement to the committee the day before, is not present. Manas Mathabane, Professor of Religious Studies, chairs the hearing. Hakim is the secretary. The remainder of the committee is composed of Farodia Rassool, Desmond Swarts (Dean of Engineering), and a professor from the Business School whom Lurie does not know. Lurie is defiant throughout. When informed of the charges, Lurie says:

I am sure the members of this committee have better things to do with their time than rehash a story over which there will be no dispute. I plead guilty to both charges. Pass sentence, and let us get on with our lives (48).

Analysis

The chapters detailing the investigation of the sexual harassment charges are rich ground for critical discourse. Taken as generic trial, the account of the investigation suggests that the underlying motive of a public trial is not to enact justice, but rather to instill guilt and shame in the accused. Also, one can draw parallels between University's sexual harassment investigation and South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation hearings.

Though the committee repeatedly denies that they are running a trial, both Coetzee and Lurie reject this claim. Lurie, indeed, refuses as a matter of principle to play along with their attempts to couch the hearing in language other than that of trial and judgment. No matter how carefully or skillfully the committee plays the game of semantics, Lurie is able to cut through the pretense and discern what they are truly seeking: a confession. His approach culminates when he says:

What goes on in my mind is my business, not yours, Farodia. Frankly, what you want from me is not a response but a confession. Well, I make no confession. I put forward a plea. As is my right. Guilty as charged. That is my plea. That is as far as I am willing to go (51).

Lurie's insight into the nature of his trial, however, does not absolve him from disgrace. The committee offers him a chance to control his disgrace by admitting it; when he refuses, he is disgraced anyway. More importantly, Lurie's insight into the psychology of shame does not mean that he is innocent of the crime he's accused of. He clearly acted with reckless and cruel selfishness in his manipulation of Melanie. He is, plainly, a rapist. So though he has subtle insight into the language games of the committee, refusing to shame himself, he is not above using similar language games to justify his lust for and abuse of Melanie. Lurie sees that the committee requires shame and refuses to compromise himself. However, Lurie clearly should be ashamed. That he isn't emphasizes his hubristic, cavalier attitude toward the world as much as his cultural insight.

On a second level, Lurie's trial alludes allegorically to events in South African history. In 1995, A Truth and Reconciliation Committee was formed by the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act. South Africa was a country devastated by the atrocities of apartheid. During the hearings, thousands of witnesses came forth and gave their testimonies. The accused were given amnesty as long as they told the entire truth. Approximately a third of these trials were heard in public. Similarly, the trial of David Lurie takes on a greater cultural significance. The manner in which he haughtily uses his status and gender to get what he wants-Melanie-is analogous to white South Africans' attitude during apartheid. Lurie, like an embodiment of the white supremacist element in South Africa, refuses to apologize for his abuse of power. This does not stop him, just as it did not stop the Truth and Reconciliation Committee from rooting out vestiges of apartheid, from being removed from power.

Summary

After his resignation, Lurie locks himself up his house before traveling to Lucy's farm in Salem, a town on the Eastern Cape. Lucy, who has gained weight since he last saw her, greets him warmly. She is a true rustic now, barefoot in a flowered dress. She makes her money from her kennel and from selling produce and flowers. Lurie stays in Lucy's girlfriend Helen's room-Helen has recently moved back to Johannesburg and Lucy now lives on the farm alone.

In the back of Lucy's farm is a converted stable where Petrus, Lucy's assistant, and his family live. That day, Lurie has an opportunity to meet Petrus, a tall man in overalls and rubber boots. At dinner that night, Lucy carefully brings up the topic of her father's dismissal. He reveals that he protested the university's insistence upon "reformation of character." Lucy appears relatively accepting of her father's action-affairs with students were not uncommon during her school years-and offers him "refuge."

Lucy introduces Lurie to life on the farm; he helps to sell her produce and to run her animal refuge. At the refuge he meets Bev Shaw, a robust woman. Bev initially repulses Lurie because she makes little effort to be attractive and her house smells of cat urine. Lurie also meets her husband, Bill. Lurie later remarks to Lucy, "It's admirable, what you do, what [Bev] does, but to me animal-welfare people are a bit like Christians of a certain kind. Everyone is so cheerful and well-intentioned that after a while you itch to go off and do some raping and pillaging. Or to kick a cat (73)."

Lurie finds life on the farm generally boring. Lucy encourages her father to stay and suggests that he find activities to occupy his time, like cutting up the dog-meat, helping Petrus establish his own land, or possibly volunteering at the animal shelter with Bev. Upon the last suggestion Lurie objects jokingly, saying, "I'm dubious, Lucy. It sounds suspiciously like community service. It sounds like someone trying to make reparations for past misdeeds (77)." Lucy replies that the dogs don't care about your motives. Lurie agrees but only on the condition that he does not become a better person.

Lurie's first job as an animal volunteer is to help restrain a dog as Bev lances an impacted tooth. Next, a goat needs to be put down after being attacked. Lurie begins to understand Bev Shaw's purpose, thinking to himself, "This bleak building is a place not of healing-her doctoring is too amateurish for that-but of last resort... Bev Shaw is not a veterinarian but a priestess, full of New Age mumbo jumbo, trying, absurdly, to lighten the load of Africa's suffering beasts (84)." Back with Lucy, Lurie decides to try and adjust to quiet country life.

Analysis

Coetzee takes these first few chapters of Lurie's stay in Salem to introduce the rural landscape and some central figures: Lucy, Petrus, and Bev Shaw.

One of the few relationships Lurie has been able to maintain over the years is with his daughter, Lucy. Indeed, he looks upon her place and companionship as a retreat from the scandal. Lucy surprisingly passes very little judgment on him. She says to her father about the affair, "Well you have paid your price. Perhaps looking back she won't think too harshly of you. Women can be surprisingly forgiving (69)." Lucy's role is altogether nurturing; she offers her father both nutritional sustenance and a place to air his controversial opinions without being ostracized. Lurie and Lucy are different in many ways, though. He says, "Curious that he and her mother, city folk, intellectuals, should have produced this throwback, this sturdy young settler. But perhaps it was not they who produced her: perhaps history had the larger share (61)." From Lurie's perspective, his daughter is somewhat of an anachronism. Yet despite their differences, they live together quite harmoniously for the time being.

Petrus is a man around forty or forty-five. He is Lucy's assistant, helping with garden and the dogs. When Petrus first introduces himself, he says "I look after the dogs and I work in the garden. Yes. I am the gardener and the dog-man." Reflecting on his own words, Petrus repeats "dog-man (64)." Petrus is immediately aware of his position before Lurie. He identifies himself not by his tribe or family name but rather by his occupation. In the course of their interaction, Lurie does not inquire any further into Petrus' personal life. Thus from the beginning, there is a distance between them. Just as in his relationship with Soyara, Lurie is markedly uncurious about this very different person. He unquestioningly accepts Petrus' servile status.

Lurie's entrance into the country is also his introduction to a special relationship with animals. From his first day, Lurie grows attached to an abandoned bulldog named Katy. The dog is depressed and unresponsive to Lurie. Yet despite this, he feels enough of a connection to the dog to fall asleep in her cage. Lurie immediately becomes somewhat sympathetic in terms of his relationship to animals. He loves Katy and feels disgust toward humans who would abandon such a creature.

When Lurie first sees Bev Shaw, he says,

He has nothing against animal lovers with whom Lucy has been mixed up as long as he can remember. The world would no doubt be a worse place without them. So when Bev Shaw opens her front door he puts on a good face, though in fact he is repelled by the odours of cat urine and dog mange and Jeyes Fluid that greets them(72).

Summary

Lurie and his daughter wake up early on Wednesday morning and walk the dogs together. Lucy encourages her father to take a position at a local university, above his insistence that he is no longer marketable. They discuss Lurie's position-having been punished for desire-and Lucy remarks that men should not be able to act upon desires simply because they have them. She is generally unwilling to abet Lurie's attempts to draw self-pity.

As they walk together, they encounter three men whom they've never seen before. When they return from their walk with the dogs, the men are waiting for them at the house and ask to use the phone. Lucy lets a young boy in to use the phone, but the other two men push past. Lurie, seeing the attack, calls out to his daughter but there is silence. He sets one dog on the attackers before being knocked unconscious in the kitchen. The men shoot the dogs with Lucy's rifle and light Lurie on fire. In the end, Lurie is badly burned. Only one dog survives. Lurie tries to comfort his daughter but she wriggles away and locks herself in the bathroom. She finally comes out and agrees to seek help from a neighbor. She tells Lurie that she has been raped.

Lucy returns with her neighbor, Ettinger, who drives Lurie to the hospital to take care of his burns. Lucy stays behind to talk to the police. After Lurie is treated he finds Bill Shaw waiting for him and is surprised to see that Bill considers him such a friend. Bill takes him back to his house, where Lurie takes a bath and falls asleep on the couch. A dream about Lucy awakens him. He goes to see her but is abruptly turned away. Lucy treats him very distantly. She decides to return to life on the farm, though Lurie discourages her from doing so.

Lurie and Lucy remain at the Shaw's, receiving treatment. He probes Bev for further details regarding Lucy's rape, worried about the risk of sexually transmitted diseases in addition to pregnancy. Bev however refuses to reveal more than what Lucy has. Cut off from his daughter, Lurie grows increasingly depressed.

Two police officers arrive to file an official report. Lucy emerges from her room haggard and Bev drives them back to the farm. Petrus is nowhere to be found. Everything is as they left it: the dead dogs' bodies are in the kennel. The only survivor is the abandoned bulldog, Katy. Lucy reports the robbery and her father's assault but leaves out her rape, even when the police notice that the bed has been stripped bare (which occurred during the rape). Lurie cannot get his daughter to tell him why she refuses to report the rape. He buries the dead dogs and offers to let Lucy sleep in his room, as she no longer feels comfortable in hers. Lucy finally explains why she doesn't report the rape, saying, "The reason is that, as far as I am concerned, what happened to me is a purely private matter. In another time, in another place it might be held to be a public matter. But in this place, at this time, it is not (112)."

Analysis

The chapter begins with a peaceful morning observing geese. Within pages, father and daughter are forever changed by horrible violence. This violence seems to take on an inevitable power of its own; Lurie has his heroic moment when he kicks in the kitchen door in order to save his daughter, but his heroism is ridiculously short-lived as he is knocked down. He is powerless to help himself or his daughter. Underscoring his humiliation, the robbers set him on fire. The dogs, too, prove unable to save their keepers.

The incident affects Lucy and Lurie's relationship as well as their bodies. The nature of the respective crimes they've suffered separates them. Lucy instructs her father, "You tell what happened to you, I tell what happened to me (99)," thus suggesting that they are not one in their misfortune. Their crimes are separate and deeply personal. Each must deal with the aftermath individually.

Immediately following the crime, Lucy feels nothing so much as fear. She does not want to sleep in her room, nor the freezer room. The crime has touched each part of the house. Lucy's room is where the rape occurred, and the freezer is filled with meat for dogs that no longer exist. Yet in the midst of her fear, Lucy's instinct is not to run away. After Lurie objects to Lucy's plans to go back to the farm because of safety, she says, "It was never safe, and it's not an idea, good or bad, I'm not going back for the sake of an idea. I'm just going back (105)."

Lucy's decision not to report the rape is critical. Lucy refuses to report the crime and divulge its details under the premise of her right to privacy, just as Lurie attempted to protect his privacy in his trial. Lucy is cognizant of the cultural context of the crime. She knows the nature of the criminal justice system in South Africa and does not hold unrealistic expectations for the prosecution of the crime. She also understands that the scales of justice can never truly be balanced. Like the pursuit of adequate confession in Lurie's trial, no verbal testimony or justification will ever be adequate reparation for the crime committed. Lucy and Lurie, thus, both share a cynical knowingness of the justice system. The nature of their exposure to this system, however, could not be more different: Lurie is an exploiter of innocence, a rapist; Lucy is a rape victim.

And so it's only natural that as time goes by the distance between father and daughter increases. Lucy's recognizes their failure to understand one another truly when she says, " No, you keep misreading me. Guilt and salvation are abstractions. I don't act in terms of abstractions. Until you make the effort to see that I can't help you (112)." Lucy is primarily concerned with remaining grounded in the here and now-in the midst of her land, her house, and her kennels. Lurie on the other hand is not tied to any physical place; what anchors him is his ideas.

Summary

The next day, Ettinger arrives with suggestions for security measures that should be taken, but Lurie is unsure his daughter will ever consent to them. Things have changed irrevocably: the only constant seems to be the abandoned bulldog, Katy.

Petrus returns with his wife in a cab, dressed in a suit and bringing with him all kinds of building materials. Lurie is suspicious of the timing of Petrus' absence and questions him; Lucy, however, refuses to consider his possible role in the crime. When Petrus comes to the house, he has heard about the robbery and asks if Lurie is okay. Petrus does not ask about Lucy. Petrus encourages them to go to the market so that they will not lose their stall; however, Lucy is not ready to appear in public. Lurie thus appears at the market in his bandages for Lucy's sake, with Petrus accompanying him. Petrus does all the work at the market and Lurie considers how times have changed since apartheid; he decides "[h]e would not mind hearing Petrus' story one day (117)."

Lurie continues to distrust Petrus, believing that Petrus "has a vision of the future in which people like Lucy have no place (118)." While helping Petrus clean out the algae from the storage dam, Lurie confronts him about the crime. Petrus does not admit any further knowledge of the event. When Lurie becomes worked up about wanting to find justice for his daughter, Petrus coolly responds that he is not wrong for that desire. Lurie meanwhile picks up the slack around the farm, caring for his depressed daughter. This care-giving role frustrates him, as he prefers to work on his Byron opera.

Petrus throws a party to celebrate his land transfer. In preparation for the party, Petrrus purchases two sheep for the feast. Lurie feels sympathy for the sheep, saying, "I'm not sure I like the way he does things - bringing the slaughter-beasts home to acquaint them with the people who are going to eat them (124)." Lucy finds his view ludicrous.

Lucy wears a knee-length floral dress, high heels, and jewelry to Petrus' party. She encourages her father to wear a tie. Petrus' home is very humble. The old stable has no ceiling or proper floor; pictures soften the walls. Lucy and Lurie are the only whites present. When Petrus greets them he introduces Lucy as his "benefactor" and says, "No more dogs. I am not any more the dog-man (129)." As her gift, Lucy has brought the family an Ashanti bedspread. Petrus' wife is expecting a child and Petrus desires a boy.

After the party has been going on for a while, one of the three robbers arrives. Lucy wishes to leave immediately. However, Lurie confronts him and asks Lucy to confirm his identity but Lucy will not do so in front of so many people. They leave the party. Lurie intends to call the police but Lucy will not let him. When Lurie confronts his daughter about why she refuses to confront the boy or charge him, she insists again upon her privacy. Lurie is sad that they no longer are like father and daughter but rather quarrel like husband and wife. After Lucy has gone to bed, Lurie returns to the party as an outsider and witnesses a chieftain's speech.

Analysis

Having returned to the farm, Lurie quickly gets to the business of protection. Lucy's neighbor, Ettinger, offers to loan them a gun. As Lurie repairs the kitchen door, he considers other options. He says, "They ought to turn the farmhouse into a fortress. Lucy ought to buy a pistol and a two-way radio, and take shooting lessons. But will she ever consent? She is here because she loves the land and the old landliche way of life. If that way of life is doomed, what is left for her to love (113)." Both Lucy and Lurie know that bars, guns, and pistols offer a false sense of security. Neither dogs nor guns nor fences can protect them from the threat of violence. Because they are white South Africans in the country, they are in danger.

Lurie is not able to pin down Petrus' involvement in the incident. Lurie's search for the truth can be described as both anthropological research and an inquisition. He rejects the simple prospect that Petrus set up the crime as payback for his servile treatment, instead deciding that the truth is more complicated. Lurie realizes that the crime is connected to culture-that it is silly to judge such a historically complex situation on the basis of simple guilt and innocence. When he envisions the process of seeking the truth, he sees himself as an anthropologist with clear objectives and methodology, conducted a well-planned survey.

When Lurie actually does speak with Petrus about the event, however, he loses his scientific objectivity. His questions become more like a lawyer's than an anthropologist's. He says, "I find it hard to believe the reason [the robbers] picked on us was simply that we were the first white folk they met that day. What do you think? Am I wrong? (119)." Lurie begins the conversation confrontationally; yet, Petrus remains calm and collected, smoking his pipe. Though Lurie realizes, in theory, that he ought to maintain a cool distance in order to understand the forces behind the crime, he is unable to do so in practicee. More and more, a rift opens up between Lurie's idea of himself as an academic and as a person. This also occurs during Petrus' party, which Lurie dreads because of his personal distaste for the sacrifice of the lamb. Similarly, Lurie dismisses Lucy's concern that calling the police on the robber at the part would disrupt this crucial event in Petrus' life.

On the whole, this section pivots on the delicate balance between personal outrage and historical perspective. Coetzee leaves us without a clear sense of which approach is best; he merely offers the dilemma in all its wrenching complexity. Lucy represents one approach-complete capitulation to cultural determinations of justice. Lurie represents another-insistence upon personal vindication. Each character recognizes the other's position, which only increases the poignancy of their growing separation.

Summary

Lurie gets an opportunity to approach Petrus about the robber at his party when they lay pipes together. Petrus does not answer the question, instead recoiling at the suggestion that he is a thief. Lurie presses Petrus, who resists, denying that the boy is guilty of any crime.

Later while working in the animal clinic, Lurie confides in Bev Shaw, relating his concern for Lucy. Bev Shaw tries to reassure him that Petrus is trustworthy but Lurie vehemently disagrees. Lurie discovers from Bev that Lucy does not think her father understands her suffering because he was not there during the rape. Meanwhile Lurie tries to give Lucy as much space as possible. He becomes more involved at the animal clinic and putting the animals to sleep begins to affect him more. He reflects deeply on his role in their deaths.

One Sunday after Lurie finishes his work at the clinic, Bev Shaw asks him about what happened in Cape Town. He tells her and she inquires whether he regrets his actions; he replies that he did not regret them in the heat of the act. The next day the clinic is closed, but Bev asks Lurie to meet her there in the afternoon anyways. On the floor of the clinic, they have sex. Bev has planned the entire event. She is ready with blankets and contraceptives. Afterwards, Lurie and Bev go on with their lives as usual.

Lurie approaches Petrus again as Petrus plows his newly acquired land with a borrowed tractor. Lurie proposes that Petrus act as a temporary farm manager while he and Lucy holiday in Cape Town for a while. Petrus declines, stating that it will be too much responsibility. Later, the police call claiming to have discovered Lurie's stolen Corolla. The police would like him to come to the station to identify the car. Lucy drives with him, but when they arrive Lurie discovers it is not his car. The news upsets Lucy, who reveals that she is anxious for the two men to be caught and fears that otherwise they'll return.

As they drive back to the farm, Lucy shares with her father the details of the rape. There were three men. The two older men were experienced whereas the youngest boy was there to learn. The act was violent and filled with hate. After their conversation, Lurie writes his daughter a note pleading with her to escape from the danger. Lucy responds, claiming that even if the path is wrong she will not be defeated because then she "will taste that defeat for the rest of my life" (161).

Lurie returns to Cape Town, stopping by the Isaacs' home in George on the way. Although he is intending to speak with Mr. Isaacs, Desiree, the younger daughter, answers the door. Lurie is immediately attracted to the young girl, who resembles Melanie. Lurie decides to meet Mr. Isaacs at his office instead (Mr. Isaacs is principal of a middle school). Lurie tries to explain himself but Mr. Isaacs interrupts him. As Lurie leaves, Mr. Isaacs appears to have a change of heart and invites him to have dinner with his family. The dinner is awkward. Mr. Isaacs' wife and daughter are uncomfortable with him in the house. Before he leaves, Lurie finally apologizes, saying to Mr. Isaacs, "I apologize for the grief I have caused you and Mrs. Isaacs. I ask for your pardon (171)." These are the words Mr. Isaacs has been waiting for. Mr. Isaacs questions Lurie about his future and, in a later telephone call, promises to intervene on his behalf with the university.

When Lurie arrives in Cape Town, he finds that his house has been raided. Appliances, shoes, clothes, suitcases, and more have all been stolen. The next morning, Lurie picks up his mail at the university. He realizes that he misses Salem and calls Lucy from a public phone to see how she is doing. He does not tell her about the raid and offers to come back if she needs him, but she declines. Lurie returns to his work on the Byron opera without getting anywhere. He decides a piano is not adequate accompaniment because it is "too rounded, too physical, too rich," opting for a banjo instead.

Analysis

Since the robbery, Lurie has been unable to get his daughter to talk to him about the rape. He has tried, for the first time in his otherwise selfish existence, to reach out, to help, but these attempts have been met coldly. Though Lurie has been ostracized before-by Soraya, after the Melanie scandal-this ostracism truly hurts him and he seems to be unable to repair it in any way. It is tied up with enormous issues-race, gender, status-that Lurie cannot simply wish away. For instance, Lucy feels that Lurie will not understand her experience of the rape because he is a man. This is not something that Lurie can simply fix. His impotence enrages him.

When Lucy finally does speak about the rape to her father, the historical import of the act comes clearly to the surface. She says:

It was so personal. It was done with such personal hatred. That was what stunned me more than anything. The rest was...expected. But why did they hate me so? I had never set eyes on them.

Lurie replies:

It was history speaking through them...A history of wrong. Think of it that way if it helps. It may have seemed personal, but it wasn't. It came down from the ancestors.

Though Lurie is able to contextualize the act in terms of the historical mistreatment of black South Africans, his daughter continues to exhibit distance toward him. The fact that he is a man stands between them; she realizes, knowing his history with Soraya and Melanie, that Lurie too is a predatory sexual creature, a rapist. Her experience has completely eradicated any sympathy she once felt for Lurie's exile. He is part of another great socio-historical injustice: not apartheid, but misogyny.

Lurie responds to the overwhelming pressure of these complex questions by developing sympathy for animals. It is almost as though he displaces the grief and shame he won't allow himself to express about the rapes of Melanie and his daughter onto a simple affection for the dogs he must kill and bury.

Lurie's transformation into a carer of animals touches the roots of his identity. The first time Lurie meets Petrus, Petrus introduces himself as the "dog-man." Lurie now reflects, "A dog-man, Petrus once called himself. Well, now he has become a dog-man: a dog undertaker; a dog psychopomp; a harijan (146)." Coetzee uses this shared description to illustrate how Petrus and Lurie have switched positions. At the beginning, Petrus served Lucy. Although a grown man with two families, Petrus lived in a stable on Lucy's property. He did the hard labor looking after the dogs, tending to the garden. Petrus no longer submits. He says at his party, "No more dogs. I am not any more the dog-man (129)." Lurie, instead, is the dog-man.

The exchange is captured also in Petrus and Lurie's cooperation in laying the pipes. Petrus treats Lurie like a child who simply hands the tools to the knowledgeable tool-user. Indeed, Lurie has handed Petrus his "tools" in more ways than one. The tools that Lurie once used to manipulate society-his erudition, his gender, his status-have become worthless and debased. Petrus' tools, on the other hand-his skillful labor, his status as a black African-have grown useful. They help him to establish his own land. Lurie has no place of his own. Whereas Petrus gains a home, Lurie finds his ransacked and robbed. Needless to say, this exchange of power corresponds to the historical exchange of power from white to black South Africans.

In the end, Lurie accepts the job that Petrus is now too good for, that of honorably disposing of dogs' bodies. His other tools are no good. As he says: "There are other people to do these things-the animal welfare thing, the social rehabilitation thing, even the Byron thing. He saves the honour of corpses because there is no one else stupid enough to do it (146)."

Summary

Lurie meets his ex-wife, Rosalind, for coffee, during which they first discuss Lucy's safety on the farm. Then Rosalind turns the topic back to the Melanie case. Despite the supposed confidentiality of the hearing, Lurie's poor performance is common knowledge. Lurie asserts that he stood up for his "freedom to remain silent." Rosalind expresses her anger that Lurie has thrown his career away for an affair. Meanwhile she mentions that Melanie Isaacs is in a play at Dock Theatre. Lurie decides to attend her performance of Sunset at Globe Salon; however, Melanie's boyfriend, Ryan, spots him there and throws spitballs at him. After the performance he asks the professor if he had learned his lesson to "stay with your own kind (194)." Later that night, Lurie picks up a young prostitute.

Lurie keeps up with Lucy over the phone. He feels that she is withholding something from him so he calls Bev Shaw. After an ambiguous response, he visits Lucy in Salem. She is pregnant, having never taken emergency contraception after the rape. Lurie must take a walk in order to not explode in front of Lucy. Over dinner, Lucy informs Lurie that the young rapist has returned. His name is Pollux, and he is Petrus' brother-in-law. Lurie confronts Petrus, who says that he would suggest that Pollux marry Lucy if he weren't so young. As a compromise, Petrus agrees to marry Lucy. The absurdity of the offer enrages Lurie. When he tells Lucy about it, however, she has already been considering the proposal. Because she is a woman alone, she needs protection. Realistically, she has no father or brothers who can protect her. She tells Lurie to propose to Petrus that he provide her with protection in exchange for her land, adding that he can publicly call her his third wife.

The next morning Lurie takes a walk with Katy. They catch Pollux spying on Lucy as she takes a shower. Lurie has the dog attack Pollux and then kicks him on the ground. Lucy comes out and stops the attack. Both Lucy and Lurie admit that the boy is mentally disturbed, but for some reason Lucy protects him.

Lurie returns to the shelter to help Bev. With her help he finds a room in Grahmstown. He buys a truck to transport the dogs' bodies to the incinerator. In his spare time, he plays his banjo amongst the dogs trying to compose the music to his opera. Lurie has a dream about Teresa Guiccoli in his sleep. She is a ghost pleading for Byron to come with her. On Saturdays, Lurie helps Lucy at the market. Soon, they are on visiting terms once again. The novel ends on a Sunday when Lurie is putting dogs to sleep at the shelter. He kills a dog that he has grown fond of without resistance.

Analysis

In the last chapters, David Lurie's alienation from society becomes pronounced. After returning to Cape Town's "civilization." He finds he has been displaced. His home has been raided. Dr. Otto has already made himself at home in his old office, and when he encounters Elaine Winter in the supermarket, he is not given a warm welcome.

Lurie's alienation begins with his attitude toward women. When Rosalind calls Lurie to have dinner, he says, "His best memories of her are still of their first months together: steamy summer nights in Durban, sheets damp with perspiration, Rosalind's long, pale body thrashing this way and that in the throes of a pleasure that was hard to tell from pain" (187). Despite the duration of their marriage and the tentative support she has given him throughout the trial, Lurie thinks of sex when he first sees her. An absence of intimacy ironically accompanies his emphasis on sexuality. Lurie becomes annoyed at her questions. He says, "Her questions are intrusive, but Rosalind has never had qualms about being intrusive. 'You shared my bed for ten years,' she once said-'Why should you have secrets from me?'" (189).

Similarly, Lurie greets Bev with the following: "He arrives at the clinic just as Bev Shaw is leaving. They embrace, tentative as strangers. Hard to believe they once lay naked in each other's arms (209)." After he sees Melanie in the play, he finds a prostitute, a young girl who is incoherent because of drugs. After she has performed her duty, feeling contented he thinks to himself, "So this is all that it takes! How could I have ever forgotten it?" (194). Lurie is back where he began at the opening of the novel, seeking solace from a stranger for pay. However this time, unlike with Soraya, there are no delusions of familiarity.

Although Lurie achieves no truly sustainable relationship with these women, they provide the reader with moments of narrative relief. Their words provide a revealing picture of David Lurie, unclouded by his delusions. For instance, after listening to his convoluted philosophical justification of his affair, Rosalind says, "That sounds very grand. But you were always a great self-deceiver, David. A great deceiver and a great self-deceiver. Are you sure it wasn't just a case of being caught with your pants down?" (188) Thus the reader is given an unobstructed alternative to Lurie's version of events. Lucy similarly characterizes Lurie, saying, "You behave as if everything I do is part of the story of your life. You are the main character, I am a minor character who doesn't make an appearance until halfway through. Well, contrary to what you think, people are not divided into major and minor. I am not a minor. I have a life of my own, just as important to me as yours is to you, and in my life I am the one who makes the decisions" (198). Thus the inadequacy of Lurie's self-centered approach to life grows clear by the end of the novel. He has stifled every perspective but his own, and has suffered disgrace for it.

Flowing from Lurie's delusions are concerns about his progeny. Until this point, grandchildren have not been a concern expressed by Lurie. In fact, despite all the discussion of sex, fertility does not enter the picture until this final section of the book. Lurie summarizes the purpose of the University's investigation as follows:

That was what the trial a was set up to punish, once all the fine words were stripped away. On trial for his way of life. For unnatural acts: for broadcasting old seed, tired seed, seed that does not quicken, contra naturem. If the old men hog the young women, what will be the future of the species? (190).

[I]t is humiliating. But perhaps that is a good point to start from again. Perhaps this what I must learn to accept. To start at ground level. With nothing. Not with nothing but. With nothing. No cards, no weapons, no property, no rights, no dignity. [Lurie replies] Like a dog. [And Lucy responds] Yes, like a dog (205).

For critics who read the play through an allegorical lens, Lurie's negative outlook for the future does not speak well of his outlook on South Africa-a South Africa where the crimes of history haunt the present. A nation conceived in hatred gives rise to more hatred. It's violence-under which white farmers suffer post-apartheid-is the natural result of prior unjust policies toward blacks. Rape begets rape. Hate begets hate.

In the midst of this desolate, perpetual tragedy, Lurie and Lucy-two South African whites who couldn't be more different-can find meaning only in disgrace. Lucy accepts a humiliating position as Petrus' third wife or concubine in exchange for protection, for the privilege of living out her years on the land she loves. Lurie, incapable of redeeming himself for crimes that seem to follow from his very being, resigns himself to bringing dignity to dead dogs. Each shoulders his or her disgrace, resigned to live for small private satisfactions in a wounded nation.

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